9
Never Wear Your Boss’s Rank or Position
“Oh, Lord, it’s hard to be humble.” So goes the song. Too often people of high importance don’t show humility. They brag, they name-drop, they exaggerate far beyond their position in life. To use an old expression, we all put our pants on the same way. I wish we all could act that way.
This attitude of deserving special treatment can extend to people who work for people of high importance. Yes, there are people who think their boss is so important, so special, so incredible that they deserve special attention by virtue of association. When that attention reverts to misrepresentation, especially when the boss doesn’t know it’s happening, it becomes a problem.
Aides, executive assistants, secretaries—the title doesn’t matter—can exceed the authority and the responsibilities vested in them by speaking for the boss without his or her permission. Power is corrupting; ultimate power is ultimately corrupting. It is corrupting in the sense that you exceed your rights and responsibilities by misrepresenting the facts or the truth.
When three officials of a foreign country registered for my National Security Studies Program, I was excited—that is, until the assistant at the particular country’s embassy in Washington, D.C., jumped in and asked for special treatment for her three VVIPs, as she called them. They needed billeting at the Ritz-Carlton in Syracuse. We don’t have one, we replied. They needed to be picked up and transported to class each morning in a Mercedes, she said. They didn’t need one; they could walk to campus with other participants, was our response.
Our policy is to leave rank at the door; everyone is a VVIP to us. When the three participants arrived weeks later, they had no knowledge of all the special requests. They were more than happy with their accommodations at the Sheraton University Hotel & Conference Center right on campus, and they happily walked to class with the other participants.
When I booked a senior government official to speak to one of the classes, I never anticipated how hard it would be to get her to her destination. Direct flights from Washington, D.C., to Syracuse are many, quick, and convenient. That didn’t work for this particular person’s secretary, who booked her, at our expense, from Washington to Detroit to Syracuse because she thought it was a better choice. Counterarguments did not prevail. When the official finally arrived weeks later, she could not understand how hard it had been for her to get to Syracuse. When we explained the circumstances to her, she was shocked. She had never been provided the options by her secretary.
After a brigadier general registered for one of my courses, my assistant began dealing with her assistant, who demanded special arrangements the general needed and required. They included special accommodations, special meals, a special bed, and the list went on. We thought we had a prima donna on our hands. When the brigadier arrived, we braced ourselves for the worst. It was not the case. Upon being asked if all the special accommodations were in order, she said, “There goes my secretary again. She does this all the time, and I never request or need any special treatment.”
I’m all for special strokes for special folks because they deserve them, not because they demand them. It’s extremely devious for an assistant to wear the boss’s rank or position when it is not required. First off, it makes the principal seem like a demon before you meet him or her, when in fact he or she has been misrepresented.
When General Powell asked me to retire with him, I arranged for a suite of offices for us. We retired on a Thursday, the last day in September. The next day I set up shop. I filled the three rooms with furniture, phones, and office equipment. When I shut the door that Friday afternoon, I was feeling pretty smug.
The following Monday I opened that same door to an eerie sound: the sound of silence. No staff, no support structure, no one but myself to talk and give orders to.
It may sound flattering to be the only employee for one of the most respected men in the nation, but it actually seemed more scary than special. Why? Because every phone call answered, every letter written, every request received had to be handled with dignity and class. He expected it, and I felt a responsibility to provide it.
There were dozens of opportunities a day to speak for him and represent him in the most responsible, authentic way. It would have been easy to exceed that authority. It would have been tempting to misrepresent that responsibility. He still had rank even though he was retired, and he still had position by virtue of his respectability and popularity. I vowed to myself never to wear that rank or position in his stead.
Popularized by Mario Puzo’s 1969 novel The Godfather, the term consigliere became a vogue word. It stood for an advisor or counselor to the boss in Mafia crime families. That person had the additional responsibility of representing the boss in important meetings or conversations within the boss’s crime family or with another crime family. A close, trusted confidant, that person had voice and power. That power can be exercised in a book, in a movie adaptation, or in real life. How it is used or misused is the issue.
You too may be a consigliere or counselor to the boss. And with that comes the power that reflects that person’s rank or position. You can do that best by knowing what the boss really needs, wants, or expects. You should communicate those things in the most honest, accurate way, never embellished but always within reason. Not too hard, not too soft, just right.
Every interaction you have with others on behalf of your boss leaves an impression, good or bad, right or wrong. It’s also an impression of you as someone dedicated to the boss’s needs but one who wants both the boss and the other party to look good. If you do it the proper way, it will turn out to be the right way.