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You Can't Always Be Mr. Nice Guy
October 15, 2004
John, you’re a good guy. You’re a likable guy. You are fun and amiable—always ready with a smile—and people genuinely seem to take to you. What’s more you’re humble. You own up to your mistakes and don’t make excuses. These qualities are admirable. No, downright commendable. Don’t ever lose them—even after I tell you, what I’m about to tell you. You’re too nice. You’re too worried about being Mr. Nice Guy.
You want everyone to like you and won’t risk their friendship to do what’s necessary. You allow personal relationships and opinion to get in the way of business. When leading means taking on the role of the bad guy and confronting someone, you won’t do it. You choose to avoid the issue and look the other way, hoping it will take care of itself. You couldn’t commandeer the ship and shout at your crew when they were tipping it too far to one side, coming precariously close to capsizing it. When Raj Bhakta got in the way and made it impossible for the designer to do her job, you sat back. You let your friendship with him prevent you from saying anything. You were content to sit back and let Kelly Perdew have it out with him and put him in his place. What’s more, you weren’t able to lay down the law and enforce deadlines. Once again, you let Kelly step into the breach and get on everyone’s case to meet them. You weren’t leading. You were standing on the bow of the ship and letting your crew steer the way. These trivial instances certainly didn’t cost you your job, but they were telling signs of how you go about your business and shed light on your well-meaning ways that eventually would.
When it came time for the boardroom, you made a crucial mistake. You out-strategized yourself. Kevin Allen and Wes Moss were the ones responsible for the over-pricing of the clothing line, which everyone felt did you in. Rather than take them both on, you ran from the fight and looked for easier prey. You gave Wes a free pass and picked Andy who, even in your own estimation, did nothing wrong—but the other guys were willing to go along with it. Certainly Raj with all of his wasting of the team’s time didn’t help any, but you let your personal regard for him lead you elsewhere. Chris was exempt, and Kelly had led the team more than you did. So what did you do? You picked the only person left: Andy.
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But the good guy that you are, you weren’t willing to say anything worse about Andy than that he hadn’t earned the “respect” of the team. What does that mean? Did you say why you thought that way? Did you back up your line of thinking with any specific examples? When Kevin flatly said, “That’s not true,” did you even counter him? No, you sat back and made it plain to everyone that even you didn’t think he deserved to be there. You may have made the choice to go after him, but you didn’t have it in you to take him down.
What’s worse, you didn’t go after Kevin. Yes, you made it clear that the crucial mistake was in the pricing and that he—and Wes—were responsible for it, but you didn’t go on the attack. You couldn’t bring yourself to criticize his decision any more than that—you didn’t rip into him for jacking up the price over the recommendation of the designer. You didn’t mention that you had instructed them to go by her advice. You also failed to bring up that they made an essentially arbitrary decision that killed you. What’s more, they made that arbitrary decision unilaterally. Knowing full well that they were pricing it above the norm, they should have brought it to your attention and discussed it with you. No, you didn’t say any of that. You simply sat back and let Kevin get away with saying that it was your fault for not having been involved. You just sat there and offered up so little protest that you let him shut you down. You weren’t willing to confront him. You didn’t take him on. You just let him turn the situation around on you. You took the heat for his mistake. You let him get away with murder. Yours.
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You weren’t leading. You were standing on the bow of the ship and letting your crew steer the way.
