I just got a note from Melissa at Fletcher & Parry LLC (my literary agency) that The No Asshole Rule will be published in Polish by Helion. Melissa sent along a list of titles that they are considering — in both English and Polish — and i thought it would be fun to ask your opinions. Let me know which one you like best. And if you speak Polish, I’d be especially curious to hear your opinions or any alternatives you might suggest:

In English:

Assholes.
The survival kit

An
asshole always will be an asshole

When
you work in moronland/assholeland

No
trespassing for assholes 

Desk
to desk with an asshole.

All
the assholes big and small

In Polish:

–
"Buce, ćwoki i buraki. Sztuka przetrwania w biurze".

–
"Buc, zawsze będzie bucem"

–
"Gdy pracujesz wzaGŁĄBiu".

–
"Dupkom wstęp wzbroniony. Zasady trzeba mieć!"

–
"Biurko w biurko z jełopem"

–
"Wszystkie dupki duże i małe"

I appreciate your thoughts.  I love the creativity here, but have no idea which one to pick.

I got a most instructive e-mail about how one work group fought back against their asshole boss: They laughed at his mean-spirited actions to help cope in the short-term and to undermine his authority, and also used his own words against him — by simply forwarding the asshole’s email’s to his boss — in the long-term.  Now that’s exemplary asshole management technique.  I need to add the power of laughter to my lists of tips.

Here is the complete email:

"We had an indescribably awful boss till recently,
who was much younger and inexperienced than most of us but still managed to
haunt us with his sadism and viciousness. We fought with the only tool that we
had- laughter… We, staff members, used to laugh as much as possible at
him- his appearance, manner of speaking, his lousy decisions, his religious
fanaticism, his hurtful comments, his rudeness, his game of divide and rule,
his favourite subordinate,  till we became immune to his asshole behaviour
and began looking forward to fresh material to laugh at. He came to know this
but was very frustrated because no-one gave him any details. It began to get
under his skin till he stopped meeting us. 

Also, I began bcc-ing his obnoxious emails
to the chairman who began to wake up to this major asshole and one day,
mysteriously, the asshole disappeared, no doubt to make life hell in some other
workplace. I feel sorry for those people. 

(I would like my name to remain confidential as
this asshole may still have the power to hurt me.)"

I include his last comment because it is so revealing.  Clearly, these folks did an extremely effective job at fighting back against this guy.  But even though victorious, the paranoia that I see in the request to keep names out of it strikes me as rational and wise.  Like it or not, battling back against a workplace asshole often requires such political savvy.

My wife Marina and I will be in New York on Monday night to attend the Quill Awards, as The No Asshole Rule won in business book category.  The event is black tie (not exactly my style), but she talked me into buying a tux for the event.

I bought it at Men’s Wearhouse after first going to Nordstrom — it was not only a lot less money, I liked the customer service better because of their team selling approach. At Nordstrom, because of the incentive system and the norms, the people who aren’t "your" salesperson never seem to lift a finger to help each other. At Men’s Wearhouse, I was most impressed by how everyone at the store in Redwood City, California, worked together to help me pick what I wanted and to make the process quick and painless.

I am scheduled to be on Fox Business Network at some point between 7 and 8AM on Monday morning, and then am planning on visiting JetBlue to see one of my former students, who is now an executive. Meanwhile, Marina, my wife, is going to meet with people at Girl Scouts headquarters in connection with her new job.

Then we are off to the Quill Awards that night with my editor Rick Wolff, my literary agent Christy Fletcher, and Mark Fortier and Rob Nissen (who both have done a great job publicizing the book).  The ceremony itself is at Lincoln Center and takes about 90 minutes.  It  will be televised on the evening of Saturday, October 27th on NBC stations. Stephen Colbert opens, which should be fun. My speech is limited to 30 seconds..I am thinking about it, but haven’t really written it down or started practicing it.  AL Gore also won an award for The Assault on Reason — I hope that he shows up!

As Marketwatch reported:

Yehuda Baruch, a management professor at the University of East Anglia
in Norwich, U.K., and graduate student Stuart Jenkins found that
"apparent misbehavior can serve an organization well." Taboo language,
they said, can manifest itself in solidarity that helps create a much
more pleasurable and productive place to work.

In the case of assholes, complaining about them, even calling yourself an asshole now and then can have this effect.  But calling other people assholes to their face (unless it is part of a teasing relationship where that is seen as acceptable fun) can be dangerous.  But this sounds right to me, as that is pretty much how people talk in every workplace that I’ve ever been.  And although Professor Baruch is right that, as rule, you shouldn’t swear in front of customers, of course that doesn’t hold at all times. For example, we expect from comedians, and so the people who bring me in to give talks about The No Asshole Rule!

My French editor Marie-Pierre reports that the French-Canadian version of the book is about to came out, and the title there — as you can see above — is  "Objectif zéro chien sale."  She reports that the complete translation is " "Objective zero dirty dog" and the subtitle is "How to neutralize experts in
insults, degrading remarks, humiliating jokes and status degradation
rituals". I love the "dirty dog" part, although I understand that the title published in France has stronger words in the subtitle; the complete title there is "Objectif
Zéro-sale-con : Petit guide de survie face aux connards, despotes, enflures,
harceleurs, trous du cul et autres personnes nuisibles qui sévissent au travail."  Vuibert, my French publisher, has a nice blog that talks about both versions.

 

There
are a lot of songs about assholes; my favorite, as I’ve written
before, is by Denis Leary. But a friend recently told me about another
one, which is called The I95 Asshole Song. Jimmy Buffett sings it and is
sometimes given credit for writing it, but apparently Campbell deserves the
credit. Here are the lyrics
and a youtube
version that pairs the song with a pretty funny slide show.

 
 
   

The evidence that workplace assholes generate a host of costs for organizations keeps piling-up.  A new survey of 180 employees by Professor Wayne Hochwarter and his colleagues at The University of Florida adds more items to the "Total Cost of Assholes."  A recent summary of this research by Jenna Bryner at LiveScience reports:

"Employees with difficult bosses checked out in the following ways:

• 30 percent slowed down or purposely made errors, compared with 6 percent of those not reporting abuse.
• 27 percent purposely hid from the boss, compared with 4 percent of those not abused.
• 33 percent confessed to not putting in maximum effort, compared with 9 percent of those not abused.
• 29 percent took sick time off even when not ill, compared with 4 percent of those not abused.
• 25 percent took more or longer breaks, compared with 7 percent of those not abused."
  

Sure, I suppose, employees shouldn’t make mistakes on purpose and they should put in maximum effort. But this research — like it or not — is consistent with a huge body of research on justice and fairness in the workplace, which shows that when employees feel "cheated" or treated unfairly (e.g., getting unfair pay cuts) they "get even" by doing their jobs less well, even stealing more according to some studies. In addition, hiding, taking sick time, and taking longer breaks are all ways that people use — and are sometimes wise to use — to cope with abusive boss that they can’t escape, as I imply on my list of tips.