Darwin Bell

Good Boss v Bad Boss seems like one long continuous thread in the workplace. I came across a piece by Washington Post staff writer, Amy Joyce employing the term Devil Bosses. Ms Joyce included a link to a tragi-comic Bad Boss contest.

One Bad Boss story that didn’t make the contest finals went like this:

My patient was a veteran suffering from trauma triggered by watching news coverage of the war in Iraq. He had been taken to emergency and when they called for authorization, my boss said they cost too much. I tried to get the hopsital to bring the price down. So, they discharged my patient after making him put $5000 on his credit card. I tried to get the money back for him and get my boss to okay paying the hospital. It went back and forth for too long.

The patient committed suicide. He shot himself in the head.

I couldn’t quit crying when I heard and took the rest of the day off. I used my personal time to do it.

My boss complained to my supervisor . He said, “I don’t know why she had to take the day off. People commit suicide everyday.”

I no longer work there. I’m in therapy now.

So . . . compared to that, how bad a boss could you possibly be right?

It occurs to me that, no matter high up we may be in an organization, we’re still middle management. I base this observation on something in the Letter of Paul to the Colossians. Speaking into an economy built on slave labor, he wrote: “Masters, provide your slaves with what is right and fair, because you know that you also have a Master in heaven” (Colossians 4:1).

“What is right and fair” is an intriguing—if metrically vague—leadership assessment for slaveholders.

Assuming (indeed hoping) you have nothing like slavery going on where you work, I don’t think it’s too big a stretch the re-render the sentence like this:

Bosses, provide your employees with what is right and fair, because you know that you also work for Someone in heaven.

This helps me contextualize what Paul wrote earlier in that same letter. I’m re-rendering again:

Workers, obey your earthly bosses in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to win their favor, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord. Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for management, since you know that you will receive an everlasting, guaranteed pension from the Lord as a reward. At the end of the day, remember that you report to the Lord Christ. Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.
— Colossians 3:22-25, more or less

It doesn’t take a genius to see how this plays out in the workplace. We all work for Someone. Those who report to God for their performance as middle managers (that’s everyone), are just as accountable as those who report to God for their performance working the line (that’s also everyone). Our stories shouldn’t show up on the Employee from Hell website any more than they should on the Bad Boss Contest website. If we claim to know something about God, we give our implied consent to be judged by a higher standard. Period. End of transmission.