出色上司的十二個信念

史丹福大學一位教授Robert Sutton最近在他的blog 談如何做個出色的上司。他近年做了很多這方面的研究，亦將在今年九月出新書，談論做上司之道。我覺得很能一言中的，在這裏翻譯出來，和大家分享一下，希望有點幫助。畢竟做上司和做人一樣，都是要學的。

這位教授說，要做個出色的上司，不僅是行爲和技巧上的磨練，也是觀念方面的改變。出色的上司都有以下“一打”信念:

1. I have a flawed and incomplete understanding of what it feels like to work for me.

我對事情欠缺周全的了解。（但偏偏很多老闆和上司都以爲自己是全知的。）

2. My success — and that of my people — depends largely on being the master of obvious and mundane things, not on magical, obscure, or breakthrough ideas or methods.

我的成功，靠的是我能對日常工作應付自如，而不是什麽絕妙的意念或方法。

3. Having ambitious and well-defined goals is important, but it is useless to think about them much. My job is to focus on the small wins that enable my people to make a little progress every day.

訂定宏大清晰的目標固然重要，但如果放太多精力想著這些目標反而徒勞無功。我的工作是致力爭取小贏，令我的屬下每天都有點進步。

4. One of the most important, and most difficult, parts of my job is to strike the delicate balance between being too assertive and not assertive enough.

我的工作最重要亦是最困難的部分，是在太過自信和不夠自信之間尋求平衡。

5. My job is to serve as a human shield, to protect my people from external intrusions, distractions, and idiocy of every stripe — and to avoid imposing my own idiocy on them as well.

我的工作是做個人肉盾牌，阻擋我的下屬免受外來干擾和各種無知的影響，同時避免將自己的無知加諸在他們身上。

6. I strive to be confident enough to convince people that I am in charge, but humble enough to realize that I am often going to be wrong.

我會盡力保持自信，使下屬信服於我，但同時保持謙遜，明白我也有犯錯的時候。

7. I aim to fight as if I am right, and listen as if I am wrong — and to teach my people to do the same thing.

我會奮力達至目標，同時做到虛心聆聽 – 亦教導我的下屬持有相同的態度。

8. One of the best tests of my leadership — and my organization — is “what happens after people make a mistake?”

我的領導力，以至我的機構，最受考驗的一個時候，是當有人犯了錯之後該如何處理。

9. Innovation is crucial to every team and organization. So my job is to encourage my people to generate and test all kinds of new ideas. But it is also my job to help them kill off all the bad ideas we generate, and most of the good ideas, too.

創新對每個團隊和組織都攸關重要。所以我的工作是鼓勵我的下屬想出各種各樣新穎的意念，並且去測試這些意念的可行性。但同時我亦需要幫助他們摒棄所有行不通的意念，以及大部分不錯的意念。

10. Bad is stronger than good. It is more important to eliminate the negative than to accentuate the positive.

壞事的影響力遠比好事的為大。消除負面影響要比突出正面影響來得重要。

11. How I do things is as important as what I do.

做事的方法和做什麽事同等重要。

12. Because I wield power over others, I am at great risk of acting like an insensitive jerk — and not realizing it.

正因爲我擁有影響他人的權力，我很易變成一個麻木不仁的蠢人而懵然不知。

說穿了，做個好上司，除了能力，最緊要有自知之明。你說對嗎？