Tai-chi Masters

In the corporate organization, big or small, there are some Managers that really manage; makes the call of any decisions that comes and delegate duties accordingly and in a way, fight for their staff, taking the fall, making himself or herself responsible over the mistakes that are done.

But there are some, who manages, but in a way hopefully things will go alright, but if the problems crop up, he or she blames the others (the staff) for the blunders. We call these people the Tai-Chi Masters.

Scenario:

Staff: Hey, I have an idea that could increase the efficiency of our department. But it needs some commitment from the management.

Manager: Hmm, I think it might be good, why not you lead this little project of yours and see how it goes.

Staff: OK.

Assuming the little project didn’t go that well. And when the board of directors asked why has there been a problem in the manager’s department, he/she might have said, “Well, I didn’t put up with the staff decision to work on it. It was just an idea that I thought it might be good, but not to go ahead.”

This of course saves the ass of the manager, but not the staff, ending up getting a bad remark on their appraisals or even worse, getting fired.

Now this is what we call Tai-Chi, pushing the fault that was made by the manager to the staff, making the staff look bad.

This is just a simple scenario, but I bet there are lots of different scenarios that the bosses would save their own asses than to protect their staff. But if the project was good, the glory would be theirs and less on their staff, maybe by saying to the directors, “Well, I thought of it for sometime, so I decided to have a go at it”

It is not easy to work with this kind of people, staff takes the fall for all the mistakes that is done, but the glory will be theirs for the taking.

Frustrating it is at times when we come across these kinds of people, and if it just happens to happen this way, get a simple black and white. The Tai-Chi Master won’t be able to avoid a blow if there is such black and white being used against them if any blunder occurs. But if it seems that these managers never change their bad habits, it is best to look for a transfer or even look for another job that has managers that really leads you and helps you to learn to climb up the corporate ladder than those who just steps on your hands not letting you climb the ladder.