5 Things You Should Never Say to Your Boss

[Майор Хаткевич]

http://career-services.monster.com/yahooarticle/things-never-to-say-to-your-boss#WT.mc_n=yta_fpt_things_never_say_to_boss



"I don't know."
Any Google-able question.
"That's not our priority."[/size]"I can't believe you did that."


Of the 5, these are actually pretty good, in the scope of running a unit, an encampment, etc. Some lessons we teach our cadets!

[Garibaldi]

http://career-services.monster.com/yahooarticle/things-never-to-say-to-your-boss#WT.mc_n=yta_fpt_things_never_say_to_boss



"I don't know."
Any Google-able question.
"That's not our priority."[/size]"I can't believe you did that."


Of the 5, these are actually pretty good, in the scope of running a unit, an encampment, etc. Some lessons we teach our cadets!

"If you're doing my job, who's doing yours?"
"It's not my day to watch so-and-so."

[NIN]

One of my employees answers my questions with " I don't know," or he immediately tells me that there isn't an answer to my question. I've been doing tech work long enough that I know there's an answer to that question if you dig long enough.

Support phone call, microsoft technet, google, whatever.

He is a good kid, but he has aspergers, and has a tendency toward linear thinking with no outside of the box answers. As far as he is concerned, if he doesn't know it then there is no need to know it, it does not exist. I have to work around his disability fairly frequently.

Finally, the other day, when he passed yet one more routine thing to me instead of answering the question himself or doing the work himself, and I went and found the answer to a question with 5 minutes on Google, I had to say to him " if I have to do my job, and your job, why exactly do I need to keep you around?"

Strangely enough he stopped answering my questions with phrases like "I don't know"

[LSThiker]

"It's not my day to watch so-and-so."

This has never worked with my wife either

[Майор Хаткевич]

One of my employees answers my questions with " I don't know," or he immediately tells me that there isn't an answer to my question. I've been doing tech work long enough that I know there's an answer to that question if you dig long enough.

Support phone call, microsoft technet, google, whatever.

He is a good kid, but he has aspergers, and has a tendency toward linear thinking with no outside of the box answers. As far as he is concerned, if he doesn't know it then there is no need to know it, it does not exist. I have to work around his disability fairly frequently.

Finally, the other day, when he passed yet one more routine thing to me instead of answering the question himself or doing the work himself, and I went and found the answer to a question with 5 minutes on Google, I had to say to him " if I have to do my job, and your job, why exactly do I need to keep you around?"

Strangely enough he stopped answering my questions with phrases like "I don't know"

My wife swears up and down that the reason she got her job was because the SCREWED UP!

"Name the 4 financial statements"
"Balance sheet, Income statement, Statement of Owners equity, and....I don't remember, but I will find out".


Figure that's a dead end on a job where you applied with a Finance degree, and are going to work in insurance.


Nope, she got the job. Later was told, a lot of underwriters will waste brokers time on google, trying to find an answer, instead of saying "I don't know, but I'll get back to you later" and let them off the phone.


Of course, where did she learn that from? She heard me say it plenty in a CAP context.

[NIN]

Occasionally, my boss will ask me a question that I don't have a good answer for..

"I am not sure about that, let me do a little bit of research and get back to you."

Sometimes though, with him, that answer is not good enough. I know a lot of things about a lot of things, but I don't know everything.

[LSThiker]

I do not know is a perfectly appropriate answer if you do not know.  What follows is important though.  In the sciences, I do not know is better than making a guess.  It may truly be not known.  Of course, if that is all you say then there is a problem. 

[Eclipse]

I've always viewed "I don't know" as better then lying or making something up, but as mentioned
it has to be followed up with "I'll find out."

Asking a Google-able question should be a termination-level offense for technical people, and
5 lashes with a wet noodle for anyone else.

[Майор Хаткевич]

I've always viewed "I don't know" as better then lying or making something up, but as mentioned
it has to be followed up with "I'll find out."

Asking a Google-able question should be a termination-level offense for technical people, and
5 lashes with a wet noodle for anyone else.

That's the thing. I had a slight culture shock when I came back to CAP as a SM. Cadets were asking questions as Officers and NCOs that I knew as an Airman! And I wasn't special, I was simply a product of dial up internet, paper regs, and circumstances that put my CAP start in a very poorly run unit. Tag on some healthy competition between the four of us and the want to run a correct program, and here we are. I initially blamed it on the "regs on a CD" practice NHQ went to, but then I realized...lots of these cadets wouldn't read the paper copies either.


So here we are, "Sir what's the rule on badges again?", and being told to use the manual, getting deer in headlights stares.

[Eclipse]

So here we are, "Sir what's the rule on badges again?", and being told to use the manual, getting deer in headlights stares.

You'd think that the current generation of cadets, who have never known an internet-less world, would be
more adept at actually using it, however if it's not in their timeline, many are lost, and we do them no favors if
we don't teach them to fish.

We were having a related discussion the other night.

#2 son asked me something dumb, and I just gave him my new "Dad look" - the one where I'm tired of repeating myself
and I am waiting for their brains to catch up with their question.

My wife gave me the standard "There are no dumb questions."

I said "Of course there are, plenty of them".

Like, for example, when you are sitting in a room, surrounded by clocks, wearing a watch, with an iTouch in your
hand and you ask me "What time is it?"

That's a dumb question.

[Майор Хаткевич]

I remember living in Latvia, doing library research for school papers. With like, actual books. And Rolodex directories. I was 10. Now? I can pull out my phone, download the reg, and find the answer in under 3 minutes.

[Eclipse]

I remember living in Latvia, doing library research for school papers. With like, actual books. And Rolodex directories. I was 10. Now? I can pull out my phone, download the reg, and find the answer in under 3 minutes.

Not to mention you were at the mercy of the sources you had access to - one encyclopedia that was 20 years old, or
a single copy of a book, etc.  Now its the opposite - you have the sum total of human knowledge with a click,
but have to learn to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Thankfully Google does that for you - the first 2-3 links are commercials, the next 5-10 are legit, and
page two usually the conspiracy theorists related to whatever you are looking up.

[arajca]

Like, for example, when you are sitting in a room, surrounded by clocks, wearing a watch, with an iTouch in your
hand and you ask me "What time is it?"

That's a dumb question.

That's when I take their device out of their hand and read the time off it in a LOUD voice. Sometimes, if I'm feeling particulalry vicious, I'll add "According to YOUR <insert device name here>, time time is..." 

[Майор Хаткевич]

I remember living in Latvia, doing library research for school papers. With like, actual books. And Rolodex directories. I was 10. Now? I can pull out my phone, download the reg, and find the answer in under 3 minutes.

Not to mention you were at the mercy of the sources you had access to - one encyclopedia that was 20 years old, or
a single copy of a book, etc.  Now its the opposite - you have the sum total of human knowledge with a click,
but have to learn to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Thankfully Google does that for you - the first 2-3 links are commercials, the next 5-10 are legit, and
page two usually the conspiracy theorists related to whatever you are looking up.

Very true!


I'm amazed that with things like wikipedia for general knowledge, there isn't a central database for anything and everything...yet.

[MSG Mac]

I had a Sergeant working for me in a Joint Command, had over 20 years in and continually asked when receiving reports, " What rank is a Lt Commander, or Gunnery Sergeant"? I put up a chart of an all services grade and insignia-she still asked!

[NIN]

Everytime I hear somebody say that " kids today are more internet savvy " or " they know more about computers than previous generations ", someone is getting a dope slap.

I worked in higher education IT for 4 years. The level of knowledge about computers possessed by every freshman class that I encountered actually went down every year. It went from most of them knowing a little bit to kids thinking that everything was an app and not understanding how to install software. I mean this is pretty basic stuff here. I'm not asking for shell scripting, fixing the environment variables in Windows, or troubleshooting the power supply.

Much all what we need today as far as information goes is at our fingertips. I don't know all of the cap regs anymore to the level of detail that I used to, because all of them changed in 2012 or 2013. However, I do know where the general subject area of something is found. "Thats in 39-3" or similar.  And I do know the look on peoples faces when they are making up references to regulations that don't exist. my cadets have figured out my response to certain questions, and what it means for them, when I say things like " do you have the drill and ceremonies manual with you?"  they have kind of figured out that when I say that they're about to be sorely disappointed.