Why I Need Human Relationships More Than a Clean Desk

I once worked for a company that was designed around six reports. By using these six reports, the owner of the firm could manage his $300 million business, and avoid most unpleasant surprises.

One year, my division's goal was to generate revenues of $100 million. We generated $100,010,000. To come that close to the owner's goal, we had to push two weeks of customer shipments into January. Yes, we deliberately slowed shipments so that the owner could have a company whose sales he could predict with great precision.

I left this firm after three years, because I did not enjoy a job in which my main task was to manage my desk well.

To please that sort of an owner, managers had to:

a.) Spend 97% of their workday in the office.

b.) Be incredibly organized, and maintain a fastidious filing system.

c.) Be tough as nails with suppliers and employees.

d.) Do everything the owner said, even when he was insulting and rude.

Perhaps you've worked for such a boss? One who values results more than people, who abhors chance and wants to reduce everything down to proven formulas?

Truth be told, this approach can work. It's not dissimilar to the way assembly lines work.

I just don't like it. Life is too short to reduce it to numbers, tickler files, and an empty Out box.

I'd much rather work in a culture in which people matter, and talent is something to be cultivated rather than rented. Growing by 12% a year, 20 years in a row is not my aspiration. Growing to my full potential - and helping others do the same - is so much more important.

For a time, my perception was that quitting that job was the dumbest thing I ever did. My entrepreneurial venture that followed was an up-and-down battle that never paid off financially... or even personally. But now it's clear that there was no other alternative. You have to know who you are, and I need human relationships more than a clean desk.

Part 2: How I Solved the Messy Desk Problem

Bruce Kasanoff is a ghostwriter for entrepreneurs and executives. Learn more at Kasanoff.com. He is the author of How to Self-Promote without Being a Jerk.

Image: in the public domain, from Internet Book Archive/Flickr