He was a boss who knew how to instill confidence in his subordinates

Here is the thirtieth unforgettable character in my life …

He was one of my bosses who made me realize the potential that I had in me. He was instrumental to get me transferred from a department where I had got bored stiff with routine work – I wanted a change and he allowed that to happen. He wanted me to set up a section and I was given a separate room and a team of four persons drawn from other departments. The day I took over charge, the first person to enter my section was the one who had been handling the work in the project group. He was beaming as he informed me that his transfer had materialized and he would be leaving for Bangalore in a couple of days. He also added that he was sending to me all the documents that he was holding. They came in a jeep followed by two steel Godrej almirahs and other furniture that he felt I would require.
I had never handled the procurement of engineering material, neither did I know the norms of provisioning, or the methods of following up with suppliers, and liaising with user departments to keep track of critical items. These were new areas to me and I was appalled at the volume of files and correspondences that he transferred gleefully to my section.

After I had settled down and was engrossed in trying to make sense out of the papers that I was in possession of, my boss phoned me and asked me to come over to his office. He offered me a cup of tea and, as we sipped the tea, he asked probing questions. Finally, he handed me a report and said that the report has to go to the Corporate office every month and would I check the correctness of the data?
I was shocked – as it is I was floundering and it would take me time to even think of vetting important information. My boss understood and asked bluntly – when can you vet this?
And I replied frankly – please give me at least six months.
Anything else? he asked.
I would like a personal computer, I replied.
Accordingly, he gave me a PC – it was one of the primitive models with two drives – you had to insert a floppy in one drive for booting and use the second drive for the floppy to store data and to generate reports.
True to his word, he gave me the six months – once I was confident, he gave the fresh report to me and I sat late into the night for vetting. It took me a couple of days since I had to get his clarifications on some discrepancies.
Finally, my version was ready. He signed it and sent it to Corporate office and told me – henceforth you will be responsible for this activity every month.
He was my Boss for the final period of my service and he taught me to be self-reliant. He would assign apparently impossible tasks to me and I would innovate to come up with solutions. It was a part of the growing up experience for me.
He has now retired as a Director at the Corporate level and, is an example of how delegation of work can build confidence in the subordinate as well as ease one’s own headaches.


Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org

Jharkhand to become plastic free, ban on polybags less than 50 micron thick

Conflict between man and elephants on the rise in Odisha

Gurgaon to get environment friendly electric buses


He was a Chinese and his assistant was a Muslim

He was framed for a crime he did not commit

He was my first boss and be taught me the basics


Clint Eastwood's upcoming film "The 15:17 to Paris"

Work on superhero film "Deadpool 2" begins

'Spider-Man: Homecoming' brings back the teenage crime fighter


Two Americans gored by bulls in the San Fermin bull running festival

At least 15 killed in shootout in Mexico between police and drug gangs

Suicide bomber kills at least 15 in Mosul