• Author: Unknown
• Editor: B-7413
• Newspaper: The Umpire volume 6
• Page Number:
• Date: 10 17 1917
• Tags:
• advice
• opinion

A CHEERING WORD NEEDED

“I used to know a man who was a genius at taking the heart out of those who worked under him. He was the original kill-joy—a paragon of pessimism. He would roll over on any one who worked under him. He was an out until he looked like a punctured toy balloon. I don’t think he intended to do all the damage he wrought. He simply did not know any better,’’ says Sid in the American Magazine.

‘‘His specialty was criticism. The minute you approached him with a suggestion he got out his instruments and amputated your new idea. Then he bathed you with an antiseptic wash of gloomy words calculated to render you immune to the development of any fresh outpouring of inspiration. If some one did a good job in the office, this man, who happened to be the boss, would come around and cheer him up by telling him how it could have been done better. He never even admitted that a good job had been done at all, but immediately set about to point out imperfections in the work. In this line, which was criticizing, he held the world’s championship. If he had been present at the creation of the earth, which is said to have been put over quite cleverly in record time, he would have hinted that the thing could easily have been done in five days instead of six—and possibly by Friday noon, or in four and a half days, if certain precautions had been taken and if the work had been more efficiently laid out with a view of speed.

“The man about whom I write this heart-felt tribute is dead. While he lived he was about as popular as the hives. Nobody derived any benefit from him. But when he passed away heleft behind him (in our minds) a thought. Here it is:—

“If you have people working for you, one way to encourage them to do more and bet- ter work is occasionally to pick out instances where they have shown signs of ability and commend them. Any worker, particularly a young Worker, is likely to be unable to dis- criminate always between his good work and his poor work. If you are his boss it is up to you to help him distinguish between the two. It is also up to you to take the young man in hand and explain to him why the good job is good and the poor job is poor. In the first instance he will be hearing something pleasant and inspiring, and in the second instance he will be in a better mood to listen to you. You can also depend upon it that the man who is intelligently praised for a good piece of work will try to duplicate that work so that he may earn more praise.

“These gloom boys—Ilike the one I have characterized above—keep an office so dark with their doubts that nobody can see where to go.”