Tuesday Morning

Behind Closed Doors — by Johanna Rothman, Esther Derby (8 / 86)

👈 Managing One Person at a Time | TOC | Keep a Finger on the Pulse 👉

Sam started the day by making appointments to meet with his counterparts in other departments.

He called the Director of Marketing and left this message: “Sam Morgan here. I want to introduce myself. I started yesterday. I’m just learning the lay of the land. I’d like to set up a time to meet with you in a week or so when I have more information about what’s going on in this department.” He also made an appointment with his boss, the VP of Product Development and the Director of Operations.

At 10:30 Tuesday morning, Sam had a half hour to walk around the department. He wanted to hear the tone of conversations and feel the mood and energy of the people. Even though Sam had a “getting to know you” pizza lunch scheduled for everyone in the department at the end of the week, he wanted to meet people before that.

As Sam wandered through the department, he stopped and chatted with the folks he’d met on the first day and introduced himself to those he hadn’t met yet.

When Sam arrived at Jason’s area, he heard yelling and went to investigate. Two developers faced off in front of a blank whiteboard.

“You erased my design! I have no idea what to do now!” a sandy-haired developer said, pointing his finger.

“What do you mean? You erased mine first!” the other shouted, tossing the eraser back in the tray.

Sam interrupted. “Hi, I’m Sam Morgan. I’m the new director. Something I can help with?”

“Give me my own whiteboard,” the sandy-haired developer muttered, “so I don’t have to share with other people,” gesturing toward his teammate.

“Sounds like you guys are under the gun. What’s up?”

The two developers explained that they were working on two high-priority fixes that affected the same module. Each person needed to see the other’s design to ensure the designs didn’t conflict. One had erased the other’s design.

“Do you guys need more whiteboards?” Sam asked.

We recently heard a story about a manager who wanted to help his staff. “You’re doing work critical to the company’s success. Can I…

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