You may have noticed this column doesn't really operate on a set schedule. Well, there's a reason for that, and that reason is me. I'll get to it when I get to it, but I do, eventually, get to it.
So for today, we've got a great question from someone in a truly frustrating situation, and the debut of a new segment I'm calling Settle This For Me, where I rule on the unserious questions ya'll like to keep sending me.
Which I love, btw.
Anyway, let's get into it.
Hi Heather,
I work at a small company (eight people) owned by a guy I genuinely like and respect. The problem is his father.
Dad is retired, bored, and "helps out." He’s not officially an employee and nobody pays him, as far as I can tell. But he's here at least four days a week with opinions about everything from our software, our filing systems, to how long our lunches are.
He reorganized the supply closet and now nobody can find anything. He sits in on meetings he wasn't invited to and then tells my boss how he thinks they went.
Last week he told a client we were behind on a project, which we weren’t.
The maddening part is that he's never exactly out of line. He’s always smiling and saying he’s "just trying to help." When I’ve carefully mentioned it, my boss just laughs it off and says "Oh, that's just Dad." In private he'll admits it drives him crazy too, but nothing changes. And I understand that because it's his father.
So now I don’t know what to do. I can’t manage someone who doesn’t technically work here, and my boss has already basically said he won’t do anything about it.
I like this job and don’t want to leave over this, but I’m starting to dread coming in.
Signed,
Fed Up
Dear Fed Up,
First thing: Dad is out of line if he’s giving paying clients misinformation. That’s a blemish on the brand your boss (hopefully) wants to protect.
You are already witnessing what takes a lot of people years to understand so I’ll state it plainly: You can’t fix this because Dad isn’t the problem. Your boss is.
Bossman has decided keeping the peace with his father is worth more than your daily sanity (and frankly, more than his own bottom line) and he’s hoping you’ll just...deal with it without making him have to choose.
Which you’ve been doing. Which is why nothing changes.
The very definition of insanity, unfortunately.
So don’t try to manage the father; manage the effects instead.
What you can do is mention the specific and quantifiable impacts to your work. Your boss isn’t interested in a conversation about feelings, BUT if you said “when your father told the Doe account we were behind, I had to do serious damage control to fix that, which took away hours of productivity. I need a way to handle that when it happens again”.
Connect every example to a concrete cost: time, client confidence, a missed deadline, and then ask for a process for when his father’s “help” becomes your problem.
Now, he may still not do a damn thing. (Ask me how I know).
I went through this myself years ago, except it was the boss’s mother. She wasn’t a fan of me (even though I was brand new and didn’t know her at all) but I was the first ‘office manager’ and “Mom” had already set the unofficial pecking order.
My coworkers filled me in on the rest fast. My boss was a good person but wouldn’t do anything about “Mom”, either.
Eventually I left for greener pastures, but I was looking for them, in great part, due to the atmosphere it created.
Genuinely liking your boss isn’t the same thing as the job being good for you.
So approach him with the concrete questions first, and watch how he responds, and let that be your answer.
Settle This For Me
Is a hot dog a sandwich?
No.
Toilet paper: over or under?
ALWAYS over. "Under" people are not to be trusted.
Picard or Kirk?
Team Picard, 100%. Give me a leader who thinks his way out versus one who punches his way out and sleeps with the sexiest alien. Come at me, Trekkies.
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