Category: The No Asshole Rule

I recently got a nice
note from a police officer named Tom, who lives near Seattle. He described a splendid “asshole management
move” that he used recently:

‘I was
recently at a conference in Colorado where four of us were giving brief
presentations.  The first three were bombarded with interruptions and
challenges by three or four people I call Nattering Nabobs of Negativity.
When it became my turn, one particular woman wouldn’t let up.  After her
first question I said, "And now I have a question for you.  Is this a
special occasion or are you always this rude?"  The audience laughed
as she slumped into her chair, never to be heard from again.’

Not bad. This
is another move to add to my “asshole
management tips.” I suspect that it
is useful on other occasions, but it is a method that needs to be used with
care. Essentially, Tom was asking (in
the terms used in The No Asshole Rule),
“Are you a temporary asshole, or a certified asshole,” albeit
in somewhat more polite language.

Delta Airlines has been coming out with some cute, and I think compelling, videos to teach their passengers a bit of etiquette. Check out this written story and the first video.   Perhaps I should see if they want to start using the Flying ARSE (a self-test for airline passengers) to help their passengers get in touch with their "inner jerk."  I love the first snippet with "middleman," who would have to say "yes" to the first question on the Flying Arse: "You put your elbows on both armrests even if there is someone sitting next to you."

This cartoon was published in The Observer this week; the fellow who sent to me reports that it is Britain’s oldest newspaper. It is a different take on ‘the rule," but does remind me of research on what happens to people when they get a little power.

P.S. On other fronts, Rueter’s had a rollicking story about Business Books: Titles that Got Attention, which talked quite a bit about The No Asshole Rule, which got picked-up by the Guardian, another newspaper in the UK.

P.P.S. If the cartoon hard for you to read  –it is for me — just click on it and you get a bigger one.

Patrizia from my Italian publisher tells me that they used this simple program at www.addletters.com to generate the sign –and there are lots of other related tools on this site as well.

I have two updates about The No Asshole Rule. This fake sign is on the blog about the Italian version of The No Asshole Rule, Il Metodo Antistronzi (the translation is something like "the anti-asshole method"): I guess that is why Disneyland is called "The Happiest Place on Earth."  Il Metodo Antistronzi continues to be on many bestseller lists there even though it has been out for a bit over three months — for example, it is currently the #1 business book and #21 overall on IBS, one of the primary internet bookstores in Italy.

In the United States, Amazon recently released their sales figures for 2007 (through October): The No Asshole Rule is among the top 100 for books released in 2007, at #34 overall and #8 among business books. It has been quite a year, and I hope a bad one for workplace assholes. The Heath brothers fantastic Made to Stick had an even better first year, at #26 overall and #6 among business books.  I suspect that most readers of this blog have already read it, but if there ever was an "instant business classic," Made to Stick fits the description.  The success of both books also kind of amazes me, in part, because I remember around this time last year, when Chip Heath and I were having a sort of wistful fantasy and saying to each other that the best possible outcome (as both of our books were about to come out) would be if both books became bestsellers, and it actually happened.

P.S. Speaking of "stronzi," I got a really funny Italian lesson in a comment from Bill Roth a few weeks back after my "fast and fun trip to Italy."  I’ve been meaning to put it in a post, and this is as a good a time as any:

Fascinating word. Italian being a flexible language, there are alot
of fun things you could do with it. For example, a plain asshole is a
stronzo, but in Italian, nouns have gender, and they also have fun
modifiers like diminutives. So you could have the following:

Stronzi: bunch of assholes
Stronza: female asshole (and don’t pretend there aren’t any)
Stronze: a bunch of stronzas.
Stronzino: a little asshole
Stronzini: a bunch of little assholes
Stronzone: a BIG asshole
Stronzaccio: a big, bad asshole
Stronzaccio: a big, bad, stronza

I just got the message below in an e-mail.  I’ve written before about Why I Call The Assholes.   But I don’t think this guy would be swayed by my answer.   I am, however, glad that he is offended. One of my philosophies is that I WANT to offend some of the people some of the time; otherwise, I am doing something wrong.  After all, when people squirm, complain, and criticize, it is a sign I’ve touched a nerve and they are actually thinking.  Plus emotionally-laden language — rather than dull words that people can’t hear — is more likely to be remembered and thus has a better chance to bring about change.  I believe that if my book was called "The No Harassment Rule," it not only would have had less impact,  I would also have written a less interesting book.  The word "harasser" just couldn’t have produced the same emotions and and wouldn’t have reminded me of the vivid stories that resulted in The No Asshole Rule.   And I think the same is true for the now hundreds of people who have sent me their stories from all over the world.  No other word quite does the trick, at least for me.

The header in the message was "Comment on your book, The No A@#&*$ Rule."  Here is the rest, with only the writer’s name removed:

" I find it a bit sad that you couldn’t get your idea
across without being offensive to some of us. Your book had many great ideas in it such that it helped spur our organization into pushing for a
"No Harrassment" policy from management. However, taking joy in the fact that the book uses a "dirty word" that I find offensive seems
a form of bullying itself. I would
imagine the response would be that if I find it offensive then I should just pass up the book, but that
seems akin to telling an African-American that he is free to plug his
ears when people in the office want to tell a racist joke."

I find his last line to be an unfair comparison, but I guess that is the way he feels.

I was just
catching-up on emails and was delighted to find this nice little story. I left the writer’s name out, but nothing else
is changed. I give this person a lot of
credit for the courage to get
out of a bad situation. I hope that story
inspires other people to leave asshole infested places. I also am impressed
that the writer told future employers the truth; it might take longer to get a
new job that way, but it also increases the chances that you won’t be hired by
yet another asshole or asshole infested places, as the note says. Here it is:

Hello-

I just
want to let you know that your book, "The No Asshole Rule" played a
huge role in my decision to resign from my job. Tomorrow is my last day and I couldn’t be more happy with my decision. A couple
of months ago, after new management took over, I was prompted to see if there
was anything written about assholes in the workplace.

To put
it bluntly, the new director of operations, seemed to be an asshole. I did not have a good feeling at all and over
the last several weeks my feelings have been confirmed. Your
book gave me such a large dose of optimism while I was immersed in a difficult
situation. It gave me the perspective to
know that there are companies and organizations out there that not only
discourage assholes but strongly implement the ‘no asshole rule’. I realized in reading your book that it was
important to me to hold my standards high as I started to look for a new
position.

I have
had several interviews and in each one, when asked why I was leaving my current
job, I was honest. I said it was
important to me to work somewhere where respect was crucial. Because
I believed so strongly in working in an environment that nurtured my belief system
I gave my notice and couldn’t be more proud.

In a
little over a week I start a new position at a company I am thrilled to be
joining. Thank
you for your writing. Your book has
been a guiding light to me over the
last couple of months.

You can see from
this note how an asshole boss can cost a company a lot of money: First, this
employee spent a lot of time interviewing for a new job (productivity costs),
then left (turnover costs), and I suspect that she is spreading the bad word
about the jerk and company in question — indeed, it sounds like that was part of her interview strategy (reducing the size and quality of the pool willing
to work for the asshole and the company). This is a good example of why organizations don’t realize how high the “total
cost of assholes” ,or TCA, can be so high.

which is easier to use.  P.S. The picture is
from this story
in ValueRich Magazine (go to page 80); the navigation is a bit awkward, but
they have a set of fantastic pictures. Each is are designed to be inserted in
various places in The No Asshole Rule.
They suggest inserting this picture on page 44, where I discuss the Total Cost
of Assholes (TCA). Or here is the pdf, which is easier to use.Download ValueRich-NoAssholeStory.pdf.

A reader named "Liz" alerted me to a fascinating new study in the Journal of Applied Psychology. According to the Research Digest Blog (a great blog that specializes in summaries of peer-reviewed psychological research  — produced by the British Psychological Society):

"Witnessing the harassment or uncivil treatment of women at work is bad
not only for female employees, but for the productivity of the whole
organisation.

That’s according to Kathi Miner-Rubino and Lilia Cortina in America, who surveyed 871 female and 831 male university employees, including academic and support staff.

Male
and female employees who said they had witnessed either the sexual
harassment of female staff, or uncivil, rude or condescending behaviour
towards them, tended to report lower psychological well-being and job
satisfaction. In turn, lower psychological well-being was associated
with greater burn out and increased thoughts about quitting."

They offer additional details; I also suggest checking out the blog in general, it is wonderful. The complete reference to the study is:

Miner-Rubino, K. & Cortina, L.M. (2007). Beyond targets: Consequences of vicarious exposure to misogyny at work. Journal of Applied Psychology, 92, 1254-1269.

This research is so important because — consistent with prior research on bullying — it provides further evidence that allowing assholes to run rampant in an organization doesn’t just hurt the victims, it hurts everyone.

Stronz-busters means asshole busters.

I had a great time promoting "The Anti-Asshole Method" in Italy. One of the highlights was a conference where speeches were given by a well-known journalist, an official from the ministry of labor, a union leader, and an executive, who all spoke out against the problem of assholes in Italian organizations.  It was interesting that the Italian term for asshole, "stronz" or "stronzi," was described by each speaker as the best term for these creeps — so it appears to translate pretty well.  And although I’ve had people make this comment to me many times in the United States, I’ve never have heard it from members of a panel at a formal conference. I also did a whirlwind of about 10 interviews for TV, radio, and newspapers (with help from three different translators), and had about 3,000 visitors to this blog from a story in Corriere Dela Sera, the leading paper in Rome, which talked about it as "Metodo antibastardi," or the anti-bastard method.  We also had great fun on Saturday morning when a producer from a TV show called "Uno Mattina" decided that my hotel lobby was too dull to shoot the interview and just walked into a bookstore a couple doors down and convinced them to let us film it there — then he decided that his parents should be in on the fun (he was perhaps 40, they were perhaps in their late 70’s) and he invited them to watch the interview, and kept putting them in background shots.  That was a lot of fun because he was so full of life.

My hosts  Felice, Loretta, and Patrizia from Elliot Edizoni  took wonderful care of me. Everything was organized well and they took me out to three long and lovely Italian dinners, plus one long lunch, not bad given I was in Italy less than 72 hours. They were charming and extremely entertaining.  It was inspiring to be around them because they aren’t cogs in some giant publishing house that is weighed down with arbitrary and silly traditions.  They are running start-up, with everyone working to do what needs to be done.  They have also embraced the web with more sophistication than most U.S. publishers.  Indeed, Patrizia was delighted when their blog on IL Metodo Antistronzi got over 12,000 hits on Friday, the day that the Corriere Dela Sera story came out.   They have printed about 150,000 copies of the book, so the "anti-asshole method" is well-known in Italy.

Felice and his colleagues will also be publishing my other books in Italian, Weird Ideas That Work, The Knowing-Doing Gap, and  Hard Facts. I hope that we can use the publication of those books as an excuse to see each other again, as they are great people.

P.S. I learned some interesting things about workplace assholes and their management in Italy, and I will write about that in a few days. 

I am on my way back from Italy (at London’s Heathrow airport) and got several emails pointing to this grisly murder of New York real estate agent and former punk rock manager Linda Stein.  The New York Times reported:

The assistant, Natavia S. Lowery, 26, of Brooklyn, said she was
driven to violence by the victim herself, who, she said, treated her
poorly, “just kept yelling at her” and even made her ill by blowing
marijuana smoke in her face, officials said.

Finally, Ms. Lowery
told detectives, she bashed Ms. Stein six or seven times in the back of
the head on Oct. 30 with what she called a yoga stick after Ms. Stein,
62, made a racially demeaning remark, other law enforcement officials
said.

“Lowery, who had been Stein’s personal assistant for
approximately four months, claimed that Stein had been verbally abusive
to her,” Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said at a news conference yesterday at 1 Police Plaza.

It sounds like a sad mess. If Ms. Lowery is guilty, her actions are indefensible, but that is a moral judgment.  When people feel trapped and belittled, they can do awful things.