Leadership Lesson Learned #5: Check The Ego At The Door

Last week I mentioned that my first real job was bagging groceries at Lucky's. I used the General Manager as a great example of setting expectations. Today's leadership lesson learned is from the Assistant General Manager from the same store.

Most of the leadership lessons I learned, have been from people who do it the right way, but on occasion we learn a great lesson from those who do it wrong. Today is one of the lessons.

One of my duties at the store was to sweep the floor every hour and as needed, sometimes I would have to mop as well.

One particular day I was doing my rounds sweeping and as I get to the bakery department area I notice a group of higher ups from the company. Our assistant GM is giving them a tour. So here I am sweeping. I'm 16 years old, and the Assistant General Manager decides to assert his power and his great leadership by telling me what I'm doing wrong and to give me an order in front of these front of his boss's boss's boss's right? To display whatever ego he had. In a very stern voice told me that I needed to mop the floor right away.

Very politely I replied that I would get it done as soon I finished sweeping the floor. I knew that if I mopped before I swept, I would only make the floor look worse. Well, this answer did not go over well with him, and he reprimanded me in front of his superiors.

I remind you, I was 16-years old. I was very comfortable speaking my mind, and going through that phase where I did not really care about authority figures all that much. Instead of complying on his second request, I bluntly told him WHY I was not mopping right away, wanting to do the job right the first time.

This response escalated his bruised ego, and he was visibly mad at me. Right as he was about to say something, one of his superiors placed a hand on his shoulder and said, "The boy is right, he should finish sweeping before he mops."

That was end of that. If this man were a dog, his tail would have been between his legs. I'm not suggesting I replied the right away, but this article is about lessons I learned from other people.

The lesson learned is check the ego at the door. This guy's ego got in the way of seeing the right way to do things. He was so eager to show his his power and his authority in front of other people, that he made himself look like an ass. And that's the truth of it. So the leadership lesson is that it doesn't matter what role you're in, you can learn from anyone. You don't need an ego. You just don't. So check your ego at the door. That's a leadership lesson I learned from someone doing it the wrong way.