3 Signs of a Good Boss | Bad Boss Part 12

We have the final bad boss video for 2024. Getting here and looking at all these bad traits and stories of bad bosses has been a bumpy ride. We’re landing this series on a higher note. This time Matt reacts to 3 signs of a good boss and agrees with everything said in this video.

There are tons of people out on social media giving business advice. Some of it is good advice, but most of it isn’t good. In this series watch CapForge’s owner react to different advice videos. He’s an expert in all things business and has 20+ years of experience under his belt. Some of the things he reacts to might even surprise you!

Video Transcript: 

Business Advice Video:

Three signs you have a good boss in the workplace. Number one, good communication skills. Number two, compassion and empathy merged into one, where they actually care and understand. Number 3, leadership skills. They are always there to lead from the front.

Matt’s Review: 

I think these are all good points. I think communication is crucial. I think a lot of times, as the company gets bigger, it gets harder and you get input from the HR department. Now, you can’t say this, you can’t talk about that, you don’t want to say things this way. And I think, although I understand it from a legal liability standpoint, I think a lot of times that stuff gets in the way of being able to just have an honest conversation with people. ‘Hey, this thing happened, here’s what we did about it, here’s what you might have heard, here’s the truth, and here’s how we’re gonna not let that happen in the future.’ And I think that is really critical, to be honest and upfront with people who work for you to communicate what’s really going on and give them as many details as possible. It is really important. And not just, yes, about this change is coming or a new policy, new procedure, or whatever, do you need training, great, let’s do training. Do you have questions? Great, let’s answer questions. And then once you’ve done that, then yes, you can start to hold people accountable for doing the new thing or whatever it is. But if you don’t communicate it, and then it doesn’t go the way you want, you only have yourself to blame. So absolutely good communication is super important. And compassion and empathy, right? We’re people working with people. At the end of the day, there’s metrics and goals and sales targets and production levels that you want to reach and whatever but none of it happens if you don’t have the people invested in doing a good job and that only happens if they feel good about where they work and they care about doing a good job. And that comes from giving them an incentive to care and treating them like people and making sure that you’re taking care of them attuned to their interests and their needs and what may be going on inside and outside of work. And that all sounds a little touchy-feely and sort of frou-frou, but the reality is if you’re a jerk to your employees, you can expect them to be jerks back and it’s going to hurt you a lot more than you’re going to hurt them. Whereas if you’re kind and caring and compassionate and treat them like the people that they are, you’re going to see that rewarded you know, 10 times over and not just by the business doing better, but you feel better as a person, I think, treating other people well. And if you don’t, you should probably talk to somebody about that. And so the third part of it is leadership. And that, again, is not asking people to do things you’re not willing or comfortable doing. Not setting expectations for people to do things that you’re not going to do. For example, you can’t say, “Well, you guys have to work Saturday. You have to work overtime. You have to put in long days to get this project done. But I’m going home at five and I’m gonna not work the weekend. But you guys have to do it.” That’s a great way to build immediate resentment and dissatisfaction, right? If you’re gonna ask people to do extra, go above and beyond, then you as the leader, the owner, the manager, you better be willing to do that as well. Go above and beyond and put in the extra effort. If they’re struggling, you should be saying, how can I help? Right? How can I lighten your load or give you more support or get you somebody to help out with this project or whatever? You don’t want to lead from the back. There’s an expression, I think, in the military, you know, leaders eat last, right? You want to make sure your crew, the troops, the employees, however you want to classify them, right? They’re taken care of first. They get fed, they get sheltered, they get whatever help they need. And then the leadership, they eat last. They eat after everyone else has gotten taken care of, right? You don’t run to the front of the line, you don’t take the lion’s share, you don’t help yourself out and leave everyone else to fight for scraps if you’re expecting people to want to follow you, to help you, to work with you, to help you together achieve something, right? That’s good leadership. These are all excellent points. If you’re working for somebody who’s doing these kinds of things, then you’re probably happy at your work environment and, you’re making a positive contribution. If your boss is a bad boss and doing poor things, poorly communicating, poor leadership, no compassion, then that’s probably a place where you want to start looking for a way out.