Work to Live is my motto.
Some here seem to think paying you a wage commands respect and quality of work.
Eh no,You can buy peoples labour but not their loyalty. Some people think money and power automatically commands respect, nope, not everybody leads their life by the mighty Euro.
Good businessmen dont make good managers. Yeh, they might make money and upset people along the way, but ruling with an iron fist is counter productive to a positive environment in an office.
I think that if you need to run an office like a strict dictator you are simply not capable of doing a good job managing your employees. By assuming most employees will take advantage of you in every turn, you are automatically programming your office culture to be me v them.
If you hire a bad worker then look in the mirror as to how you judge a persons character. Your obviously not good at spotting good talent (instead of moaning about them).
Yes an employee in general will probobley do whatever they can get away with, but with the right balance of rules, discipline and fairness an employee will not take the mickey. Problem is that most businessmen couldnt manage an office if their lives depended on it. Their main concern is the bottom line. Thats fair enough but they should hire people qualified to harness employees strengths (try telling a businessman they are not qualified for a specific job in their company!! Oh My!). Or at least in a small company try going to some sort of HR or Managing training, more then likely most businessmen would be at odds with recognised management practises ! !
I remember hearing this quote from some bigwig exec being interviewed on some radio show thats always stuck with me. Any idiot can manage employees, its the good managers who can manage the difficult employees.
Are you a business owner? If so do you share your profits amongst the staff or expect them to give the above commitment for your benefit? Reading some of these posts I'm appreciating my current employer more and more!!