Bad Bosses: Horror Stories and How Not to Become One
Social Geek Radio | Host: Jack Monson
Duration: 40 minutes | Air Date: May 20, 2025
Featured Panelists
Derrick Ableman, CFE — Brand Director, Northeast Color
Ali Kraus — VP of Marketing, Benetrends Financial
Danielle Wright — Franchise Executive
Kristen Pechacek — CEO, MassageLuXe
Scott Greenberg — Best-Selling Author & Keynote Speaker
Brought to you by: Vendasta, Franzy, Hughes, Citrin Cooperman
What We Discussed
We've all had them. We don't want to become them. The Franchise Rock Stars share horror stories about bad bosses and unpack what makes leadership go wrong—and more importantly, how to avoid repeating those mistakes in your own franchise organization.
Key Takeaways
Bad bosses teach valuable lessons — Sometimes through positive examples, sometimes through cautionary tales of what not to do
Separate the person from the situation — You're not in a role to please a difficult boss, but to learn something about yourself and develop your own leadership style
Toxic vs. challenging environments — Not all pressure is bad; certain types of intensity can be privileges that sharpen your skills and reveal your character
Know when to stay and when to leave — Learning to distinguish between growth opportunities disguised as difficulty and genuinely toxic situations requiring exit
Self-awareness is the foundation — Great leadership begins with understanding your own management style and how it impacts your team (featured discussion on Scott Greenberg's certification program)
Personality differences aren't dealbreakers — Sometimes what feels like conflict is actually an opportunity you're not seeing yet; avoid letting personal friction blind you to growth
Take ownership without self-immolation — You can engage work with integrity and learn from difficult leaders without sacrificing your wellbeing or humanity
Episode Guide
00:00 — Introduction: We've All Had Them
05:12 — Horror Stories: The Panel Shares Bad Boss Experiences
12:35 — When Pressure Becomes a Privilege
18:20 — The Candle Metaphor: Learning Through Intensity
24:45 — How to Avoid Becoming the Bad Boss
29:30 — Scott Greenberg's Leadership Certification Program
35:15 — Recognizing When It's Time to Leave
38:40 — Final Thoughts: Leading With Humanity
"I've had a number of volatile and difficult bosses in the course of my career and I've learned something from all of them. While I would never recommend staying in a toxic or abusive work environment, certain types of pressure can be privileges. The trick is to separate the person from the situation and recognize you're not there to please them, but to learn something about yourself."
— Derrick Ableman, on extracting value from difficult leadership experiences
Explore Related Topics
→ Imposter Syndrome in Franchising — Transforming anxiety into productivity
→ Work-Life Integration (Not Balance) — Staying present without burning out
→ Leadership Development Resources — Scott Greenberg's Stop the Shift Show
→ View All Podcast Episodes — Social Geek Radio archive
Featured Resource
Scott Greenberg's HEMS Leadership Certification
Scott mentioned an innovative certification program designed to help franchise leaders develop self-aware management styles. Learn more at www.hemsworldwide.com
-
SOCIAL GEEK RADIO: BAD BOSSES
Full Episode Transcript
Air Date: May 20, 2025
Duration: 40 minutes
Host: Jack Monson
Panelists: Ali Kraus, Danielle Wright, Derrick Ableman, Kristen Pechacek, Scott Greenberg[00:00:00] INTRODUCTION
ANNOUNCER: AI was not used in the creation of this podcast. This is the Social Geek Radio network.
JACK MONSON: Hello Geeks and welcome to the Social Geek Podcast. I'm Jack Monson, your host and marketing consigliere. Bad bosses. We've all had 'em and we don't want to be 'em. Today the franchise Rock Stars are here to share some horror stories and some advice. Join Ali Kraus, Danielle Wright, Derrick Ableman, Kristen Pechacek, and Scott Greenberg.
[00:01:00] WELCOME AND TOPIC INTRODUCTION
JACK MONSON: Alright. Today's show is brought to you by Citrin Cooperman, Hughes, SSTA, and Franzy. Here come the rock stars—like Derrick's not prepared with 17 pages of written notes in his hipster notebook.
Alright, here we go. We are back with the franchise rock stars. Joining us today, we've got Danielle Wright, Derrick Ableman, Kristen Pechacek, Ali Kraus, and Scott Greenberg. Welcome one and all. It's been a while since we've all been together.
ALL: Hey! Yes. Hey, hey.
JACK MONSON: You've been doing little crews, but the family is here.
SCOTT GREENBERG: Yeah, it is kind of like getting together with those friends from college or something where you just start the conversation. So anyway, as I was saying...
JACK MONSON: Right! So Scott, you and I were chatting a few days ago about some bad bosses and I think most people we know have had an experience or two with a supervisor who was maybe not the best mentor on Earth. Give me your opening thoughts. You talk to a lot of people in business every week, from C-Suite to franchisees, to frontline workers. What makes some of these people a bad boss?
[00:02:00] SCOTT GREENBERG: THE BAD BOSS PROBLEM
SCOTT GREENBERG: It's common—it's an icebreaking question to ask a group of people, "Hey, tell us about your most embarrassing moment." And we all have 'em, but some of us struggle. But if you say, "Tell me about a bad boss you have," they are excited, enthusiastic, and something's gonna come up. Except for the employees who used to work for me at Edible Arrangements—they will be at a loss—but everybody else really, they come up with stuff and we've all had them.
And that's had a lot to do with the work that I do. And this is relevant to franchising because there are people who maybe have had no experience being an employer, being a boss, right? But they can suddenly find themselves being in charge of an entire team of people when they open up a franchise.
My big complaint is that most brands—those people get very little training, very little preparation to actually manage people. So I feel like in some ways our industry passes on this legacy of bad leadership. Well, it'd be great—it's great for conversation because there'll be that many more people with bad bosses. But I think it's something that's kind of worth exploring and that's why I kind of brought it up to you.
JACK MONSON: Yeah. I love that idea of training people to actually lead other people because so many people get into franchising and they think they're in the window installation business, but what they're actually in is the people business. And that part of the training doesn't usually happen.
[00:03:00] THE NEED FOR LEADERSHIP TRAINING
JACK MONSON: And how can we tell people that we're gonna teach you everything you need to run a successful business, but not help them with building teams and building culture and understanding how to conduct great interviews that bring the truth out? And I wanna say from the very beginning, none of that has anything to do with dictating HR policy.
And I've talked about this with plenty of franchise attorneys and they agree that there is a difference between providing education and actually dictating required HR policy. So I think it's gotta be a priority, especially—you know, people want speakers at conferences to talk about hospitality and customer service. That goes hand in hand with having engaged employees, which requires great management. And I think our industry can just do so much better on this front.
JACK MONSON: So, Scott, looking back on your career before you became a keynote speaker, and maybe even before you became a franchisee, tell us a story about a bad boss you had in the past.
[00:04:00] SCOTT'S STORY: AMANDA THE MICROMANAGER
SCOTT GREENBERG: I've had one full-time regular corporate job in my life. Wow. And that is why I chose to become someone who is self-employed. 'Cause as stressful as self-employment is, and as abusive to myself as I can be, not as much as Amanda.
So it was at a Hollywood production company. She was my direct supervisor. In the beginning, she was nice. She said, "Let's schedule a lunch," and was just all warm and fuzzy and it was great. And then day two, suddenly things got busy and that's when the truth comes out.
And so she comes to me and she says, "Hey, I need you to FedEx this document across town. You know how to FedEx things, right?" Well, there's only one right answer to that question, which is, "Yes, of course." I had no idea.
[00:05:00] SCOTT'S FEDERAL EXPRESS LESSON
SCOTT GREENBERG: So I go to the mail room, let me figure it out. It gets done. Two days later she said, "Scott, so who signed for that package?" I said, "Sign for the package?" She said, "Well, you tracked it, didn't you?" I didn't know what tracking meant. Okay, I'm not an idiot. But when I was at UCLA, I didn't take Federal Express class.
You know, they knew it was my first job. I said, "I'm sorry, what's tracking?" I'll never forget her response. This was 30-something years ago. I remember it like yesterday. She looks me in the eye and she says, "Come on Scott, you gotta think." She points to her head where the brain is to demonstrate, okay? And then she walks away, didn't teach me anything, didn't leave me with encouragement. She canceled our lunch and suddenly got icy cold for the next day, and in a matter of weeks I was gone.
She just had no investment in my success, no investment in my training at all. And it was scarring. Like decades later, I remember it and I just felt it in my bones.
JACK MONSON: And you didn't leave that job or that industry. You left that person. And I think that's what I want to get down to today is people don't leave the company or the corporation or the logo. They leave because of that person. So do we know what became of Amanda?
SCOTT GREENBERG: Yes. I looked her up a few years ago and she was no longer working at a big company. She was trying to make a go of some kind of solo thing. You could tell it wasn't that great and I had the most wonderful schadenfreude—the most wonderful joy in seeing that she hadn't necessarily progressed all that long. I know it brings out my base, horrible thing, but it just, you know, sort of just desserts. I do wish her well, I have let go. But I haven't forgotten.
[00:07:00] KRISTEN PECHACEK: GOING OVER YOUR BOSS'S HEAD
JACK MONSON: Yeah. Well, we're all lizard people at some point when it comes to work, right? We've gotta remember that we've got that reptilian brain and people like Amanda bring that out in us. Alright, let's go around the room. Kristen Pechacek from MassageLuXe. What's up KP? Tell me about a bad boss.
KRISTEN PECHACEK: Yeah, so hi Jack and hi everyone. I miss you and I can't wait to see you in person soon. My bad boss story comes with a career lesson—a tough one, one of probably the toughest that I've ever had.
Early on in my career, I had a boss who was all over the place emotionally, so much so that the entire team didn't know what kind of a day they were going to have until this person walked into the room and was either on one of the highest highs or the lowest lows, whether that be laughing and jumping and skipping around, or tears and sulking. And it dictated the entire team's morale and feeling and the productivity. Like it was literally so toxic that I couldn't even begin to describe to you the toxicity that occurred.
[00:08:00] LESSONS ON GOING OVER YOUR BOSS'S HEAD
KRISTEN PECHACEK: And everyone—all we talked about was that person and how badly that person needed to be exited. And I felt this responsibility as a young, but outgoing and kind of a forward professional to be the advocate, to try to exit my boss because of this situation. And lesson learned, terrible. Not proud of it now, but I went to my boss's boss to express the concerns around this particular individual and their inability to establish the team in a way that it needed to be done because they were so up, down, never plateaued. And it impacted the whole team.
And I'll never forget it because I thought that I was doing this big justice for the company. I had my notes, I had my conversation prepared, ready to talk about how it would be in the company's best interest to exit this person. And I got my hand slapped hard.
JACK MONSON: Oh no.
KRISTEN PECHACEK: Oh yeah, I remember the conversation. That's exactly what you didn't want to have happen. Exactly. And this person whom I respect very much was like, "Kristen, what are you doing? You right now are talking to me about your boss and trying to get her fired and that is not something that I will tolerate regardless of whether she's good or bad."
And I walked out of there like a puppy with a tail between my legs. I thought I was getting fired. I was mortified. Everybody around me knew that I was gonna go in and have this grand gesture. So they were all like, "How'd it go? How'd it go?" And I'm like, "Oh, not well at all." Oh my gosh.
And of course, the boss's boss told my boss. So then my boss was super mad at me and I was like, "I'm totally getting fired from this position." So I kept a low profile. Learned never to go above your boss's head if you have an issue with your boss.
[00:10:00] LESSONS ON LETTING SHIPS SINK
KRISTEN PECHACEK: And you know, it's funny how these things work out, but less than 60 days later, she was terminated because her peers went to her boss to talk about her.
JACK MONSON: Now, did you spark something with some of her peers? Did they hear about anything or?
KRISTEN PECHACEK: Well, she was probably an awful person on all fronts, right? Exactly. Yeah. So I mean, maybe they did, maybe they didn't. But you know, there were people around me that could have advocated for the team that I was on that would've helped make this a lot better. And I think the lesson here is sometimes, especially if it's your boss, you have to let sinking ships sink themselves. You don't need to be the person to help them sink themselves. Eventually those things all work out.
JACK MONSON: Yeah. I think at some point most people need to decide, is it fight or flight, right? Am I going to leave and find another role somewhere—and I hope more often that's the case—or am I going to stay and try to fix this person, fix this company? And that, especially for someone early in their career like you were at the time, that's a lot to put on yourself.
So have you kept up with this boss?
KRISTEN PECHACEK: Yep, sure have. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have a pulse on where she's at and what she's doing. You know, and I think at the end of the day too, there's two ways to look at it. Like, I look back at that time and I seriously had nothing to talk to anybody about after she was exited because that's all I had talked about for so long, right? There's like this swirling drama that we were all caught up in.
[00:12:00] TAKING FORWARD WHAT NOT TO DO
KRISTEN PECHACEK: And you can look back at that and you can cast all the shade that it brought to our lives during that time. Or you can take forward what you would never do as a boss. And that's what I've chosen to do. Stay pretty plateau in my feelings.
JACK MONSON: That's a very common theme I hear, and I don't think it's specifically in franchising or marketing or some of the places where we've both worked, about having that boss whose mood on a particular day is going to dictate our level of productivity. And I think that's the type of thing that if you know now that you're a CEO, if you see that happening in your organization, I think you're probably more prone to nip that in the bud because you can't rely on someone's instability to affect the value of your company.
So yeah, I think all of these things, we hopefully take them with us to make us better leaders now and in the future. Having been through some bad experiences.
Danielle, I'm gonna go to you next. You work with a lot of people who are transitioning, perhaps from a bad boss and getting into franchising and owning their own business. So I'm sure you've heard a million stories like this. And do you have any experiences in your own past that you wanted to share with us today?
[00:13:00] DANIELLE WRIGHT: GENDER AND BAD BOSSES
DANIELLE WRIGHT: It's funny 'cause kind of like Scott, I've maybe had three full-time jobs post-college with bosses because I don't do well in the "hey, have a boss" scenario. They don't really like me. I don't really like them. And kind of like Kristen, I wanna find every way under the sun to blow up your ship.
But a lot of experiences or conversations in and around bad bosses really, I find, are divided. There's the person—you don't mind the person. It's more of their leadership skill into what Scott was talking about. We're not teaching people how to be good leaders, or my word for the year is "aware"—there's just not enough awareness to what they're doing to the person, to the group, to themselves.
I have a really recent experience that the person is great, but they can't, they won't go get CEO coaching. They won't go find personal development. And I think we've had a conversation around that. It's like, what makes a bad boss? It's generally them and what are they doing to not be the bad boss and are they even aware of it?
So a lot of people, to your point, don't wanna leave the job. They just wanna leave the person and there's not really a pathway to go into another field in that org. And I've had that experience too. I can't stay with them because this is the space I wanna be, but I can't continue to work with them.
[00:15:00] JACK'S STORY: THE INCOMPETENT SALES BOSS
DANIELLE WRIGHT: And some observations I've had are kind of gender related too. We have a harder time on my side. We wanna try to fix them, or "Oh, it's probably me. I need to..." There's more fingers pointing internally at ourselves than there is externally. And that bad boss is just a bad boss. So I don't like bad bosses, hence the reason why I don't have them.
JACK MONSON: Smart move. Somewhere along the line you figured that out. I'll tell a quick story about a bad boss I had that fits into that category of not an evil person, not someone I would hang out with, but you know, probably not a terrible human being, but just so incompetent at his job that it made my performance suffer. And this was specifically in a sales arena. And I'm not gonna name any names because I'm pretty sure he listens to this podcast, but...
It was a sales situation. We were selling all kinds of digital marketing things like I've done for years and years and years at many companies—websites and advertising and all these kinds of things. And his—as the CEO and owner of this organization—his sales approach was to go to a company and say, "Your website's awful. Your advertising sucks. It looks like some idiot created your marketing campaign," and he's usually saying this to the CMO.
Even if some of those things were true, no one really wants to hear how ugly their baby was. Right? And he was really just saying it to try to make us look better than the lousy agency that they were currently using. And he did this for a long time and it just never worked, right?
[00:17:00] THE NEGGING SALES APPROACH
JACK MONSON: Like, you can make a moral or an ethical argument for it, but it also, it was just a poor business idea. And he did this day in and day out, and I was with this company for about a week when I realized I've just made the worst mistake of my career, and how soon can I get outta here? And that's what I did, you know, fight or flight. It's his company. He's the CEO. I'm just a guy who works here. I'm out.
ALI KRAUS: I get a lot of those emails still, Jack.
JACK MONSON: So I hope that any digital agency listening takes a note because I don't even just get them. Here's one worse—they go to my CEO who then forwards them to me to say, "Does your shit suck?"
DANIELLE WRIGHT: Yeah. And don't you just wanna put on some list somewhere of these people and say, "I will never, ever, ever do business with these people or their brand"?
JACK MONSON: Right. It's my first thought when I read those emails. It's amazing to me that people are using these tactics because—does it work for somebody? I can't imagine that works.
SCOTT GREENBERG: But in the dating world, Jack, it's called "negging" and I don't understand it. It seemed like a very bad dating premise to me. I've never tried it. I've never experienced it, but apparently there's a philosophy of courtship where you make someone feel super bad about themselves. I don't understand how that works.
JACK MONSON: Right. I got married to my wife before the internet really did what it was doing now. So I don't know if that conditioned people to want to be denigrated.
[00:19:00] SPONSOR: SSTA AI EMPLOYEES
ANNOUNCER: Here's a tip from Vendasta. On average, less than 40% of franchise locations hit their annual revenue goal. If your franchise locations are struggling to generate leads and convert them into customers, deploy SSTA's AI employees to all of your locations.
SSTA's AI employees generate local search traffic, answer phone calls, send text messages, write emails, book appointments, request and respond to reviews, create social content and so much more. Your franchisees will get to focus on running their business, hitting their revenue goals, and becoming wildly profitable. Try your first SSTA AI employee at ssta.com/franchise.
[00:20:00] SPONSOR: FRANZY
ANNOUNCER: If you are a dreamer, a go-getter, or someone looking to own a business, listen up. Franzy is the ultimate platform to make franchise ownership accessible and achievable for everyone from corporate escapees to side hustle seekers and investors.
Franzy does more than just list franchises. It's equipped with the Franzy franchise score—an AI powered matching tool that finds the best brands based on your financials, experience, risk tolerance, and goals. You can also get pre-qualified to see exactly what you can afford, check brand availability in your area, and discover the hottest new concepts hitting the market.
And if you need guidance, Franzy's team of expert coaches is there to help you navigate the world of franchising and find the right opportunities for you. So whether you're just starting or looking to expand, Franzy's got everything you need. Head over to franzy.com/socialgeek and start your journey to business ownership.
[00:21:00] SPONSOR: HUGHES DIGITAL SIGNAGE
ANNOUNCER: Using digital menu boards is a strategic decision that can boost revenue and improve customer experience. Hughes Digital Signage delivers immersive digital experiences that engage customers, employees, and visitors alike.
Show your customers targeted communications in-store—pictures or video of menu items they can order. Exhibit promoted items that match in-market ads, or highlight items that meet inventory availability. Hughes Digital Media Solutions are easy to use and managed via an online administrative dashboard.
Reach out now to find out how Hughes can become your digital menu board and digital signage provider. Visit hughes.com/franchise.
SPONSOR: CITRIN COOPERMAN
ANNOUNCER: Citrin Cooperman is proud to be the home of one of the leading franchising practices in the country. With over 40 years of franchise experience, Citrin Cooperman provides a full range of services to a vast number of franchise concepts.
They work with the owners, operators, controllers, and CFOs of a wide range of franchisors and multi-unit franchisees to help them establish their brands and grow their businesses to the next level. The Citrin Cooperman franchise practice is comprised of experienced CFE accredited professionals providing franchisors and multi-unit franchisees the guidance and insight they need to minimize uncertainty, meet compliance and contractual obligations, and stay focused on building their businesses.
For more information, please contact Aaron Chesky and Michael Iannuzzi at citrincooperman.com.
[00:22:00] DERRICK ABLEMAN: POWER AND IMMATURITY
JACK MONSON: Derrick, give me your best bad boss story.
DERRICK ABLEMAN: I have too many to choose from. And also they're all litigious, so I'm gonna stay away from—
JACK MONSON: Yeah, I'm sure.
DERRICK ABLEMAN: You've asked everybody if they're still checking in on people. I'm sure that I'm still being followed like a Japanese ghost by these people somehow. I'm sure they're just behind me if I turn around quick enough, so I'm not gonna do that.
But I will tell you that I have had loads of bad bosses and I've had so many bad bosses, and they were so bad in such particular ways that they actually put me off from wanting to seek leadership positions in my own career. It made me really, really distrustful of positions of power and it seems like a very corrupting thing.
It caused me to really reflect on what's the motive, what motivates a bad boss. And it kind of seems to me in some parts, sometimes that it comes down to power, whether consciously or unconsciously. And I think you can define power in a lot of different ways, but you can always see how bad a boss is by how they respond to challenges or things not going their way.
[00:23:00] THE HAIR TRIGGER TEMPER
DERRICK ABLEMAN: And I think that part where things aren't going your way—it's not in contrast to a vision that they have for the company or how they think a task should be done. It's personalized in this way that is literal. And it kind of suggests this immaturity at the heart of a bad boss where things should be how they want them to be, not necessarily what's best for everyone or the company or the world or anything like that. Like there could be some overlap, but it's just not how they want things to be. And there's this toddler level to that.
And I think that part of it has to do with—like a bad boss, to a bad boss, the world is like a kind of a mirror. And they see themselves in everything because they've convinced themselves that everything is on them, maybe at some level, that they're responsible for everything. And so this whole enterprise is literally an extension of their ego, as you were talking about, like someone's—the entire company's productivity could be dependent on someone's mood.
And I think that there is some power pull there. And I think that, you know, that's where the micromanaging comes in. That's where the intimidation comes in. That's where the condescension and the hair trigger tempers can come in because you can't have a self balloon it out to the size of a department or a company and have that self remain coherent. Like it's gonna shake apart. You can't see yourself everywhere and see the same thing all the time.
And so, yeah, I mean, to me that's what a bad boss is. Someone that struggles with boundaries at an almost psychological level or like at the level of self.
JACK MONSON: Yeah. Yeah. I love what you said about, you know, having the hair trigger temper. I think when we think of bad bosses, that's probably the first thing a lot of people think of is someone who just walks in and is yelling and screaming all the time. I had one of those guys too, for a short amount of time. That guy was probably the one guy who influenced me the most in a different way in that I decided I'm never going to raise my voice at anyone who works for my company, ever.
And I also expect that from our clients to our team. And I also expect that from our vendors. And like, we don't raise our voice here, right? You take that somewhere else. But you know, we can have debate, we can have hot debates and get into some heated disagreements, but we're not gonna yell and scream because you just look like a clown, right? More important, you just look like a clown.
So thank you very much for that, Derrick.
[00:26:00] ALI KRAUS: FOUR TYPES OF BAD BOSSES
JACK MONSON: Alright, Ali, you're up. Give me a bad boss story. You've had a few different industries that you've been in in the past decade or so. So what do you got? What's a good one?
ALI KRAUS: Yeah, I actually liked that I got to go last because I was about to share—well, so Scott kicked it off with, it's interesting that this is something we all like to talk about and trauma bonding is a real thing. And so there's a quote that "there's no bond like the one built from surviving the same storm." I think that's why we like to talk about bad bosses because so many people can relate and you can dive right into stories.
But I have been in a lot of different industries. I was a teacher, I've been a franchisor, I've been a supplier. I'm in marketing. So I have grown to actually appreciate bad bosses in a way, because, similar to what you were just saying, Jack, that you vowed to never yell, I've taken pieces from different types of people who, rather than learning the positives from them, I know exactly who I don't wanna be for my team.
And so I do this with a lot of things in life, but I have names for all of my former people and they're defining because I'll just tell you what they are. So I've had the narcissist, I've had the cult leader, I've had the ghost, which is really just somebody who disappears anytime you need them. They never answer emails. That's a ghost to me. And then the placeholder, who is somebody that's filling the role but not actually there mentally, emotionally, physically.
[00:27:00] MANAGING UP AND UNDERSTANDING YOUR BOSS
ALI KRAUS: And so you can define them as bad however you want, but for me, those four types of leaders were people that I started to actually become really fascinated with. Why is this person that way? So let me understand the traits of somebody who's a narcissist, because as an employee, I'm not gonna change them from being a narcissist. I'm not gonna educate them on what a narcissist is. But I've learned that for me personally, I can understand how that person works and ticks and speaks to you differently. And I can actually personally manage it differently when I understand, "Oh, it's because you are a narcissist," or, "Oh, it's because you don't wanna be here anymore. You're the placeholder that's been in this job for 20 years and God, you want out and I'm sorry for you."
But, so for me, it's this deep true understanding of who are you, why are you this way? What made you this way? And defining it has helped me handle myself, manage myself more professionally while also learning that I don't wanna be that kind of leader. So I don't need to take your positives 'cause very similar to Derrick, when I was a teacher, I had jumped schools three times because I kept thinking, "The grass is greener, the grass is greener. I'll find a leader."
And as a teacher, the only space for growth, or at least in my opinion, was becoming a principal. It's how you make more money. It's the next step. Well, I didn't wanna be a principal because I had horrible principals—horrible ones. A couple great ones, but also horrible ones. And when I finally—the day I decided, "I'm done teaching. I need something else. This is not growth. Love the kids, but gotta get out."
I told my principal, I will never forget the day I walked into our office. I know exactly what type of candle was sitting on the bookshelf. I sat her down and she was the ghost. Never answered me when I needed her. Wasn't there when I wanted to talk about opportunity and I told her, "I'm quitting. I'm done teaching. I'm not just leaving your school. I'm done."
[00:29:00] HOW LEADERS RESPOND TO DEPARTURES
ALI KRAUS: And I kid you not, this woman in her fifties slammed her forehead on her desk and said the F word. And in that moment I knew I made the exact right decision. You were not there for me. You did not show up. You were missing when I needed you. I was never gonna grow with you. And now you regret I'm leaving because I was, in fact, as good as I thought.
JACK MONSON: Yeah.
ALI KRAUS: To wrap up all of these bad bosses here. Something I want everyone to remember who's a leader is when someone quits and someone leaves or gets promoted or is onto the next job, which we all know happens all the freaking time in franchising, the way you respond to them defines you forever.
And the way she literally dropped an F-bomb in an elementary school while hitting her head on a desk, I will never forget that response. Likewise, when I left Entrepreneur Magazine and I am calling them out because that CEO got me on a phone call and I had never had a private meeting with him and I thought, "Oh my God, he's gonna do what—this is crazy, I'm so scared."
And he thanked me and told me how proud he was. And even though I wasn't there long, it was an honor to know me as a person and he couldn't wait to see the things I do in franchising. And that—there's a leader right there, folks. So think about when people are leaving, how you respond, because I will always hold a really high respect for the integrity of that man. He did not need to get me on a phone call. I was not that important. But he did it anyways because it was important to him and it positively changed me.
So I am wrapping up all these cult leaders and ghosts and narcissists with a positive story because we can do good even in really hard times. And at the end it defines you.
[00:31:00] KRISTEN ON MANAGING YOUR BOSS
JACK MONSON: Yeah. 'Cause even at some point he might've been like, "Oh, now we've gotta replace this person," or "Now we're gonna be short on this or that, or something." But I think a good business practitioner realizes this person's already gone. Right. She's already given notice. I can have a fit. I can look like a clown, I can slam my head on the desk and it's not going to matter. So why don't we try to make something good out of this situation? So yeah, that's real leadership there.
Kristen, Ali, you said something to kinda, again, look at the positive side or the "what can you do about a bad boss" side of things. You mentioned that you just learned how to manage your bosses more effectively.
KRISTEN PECHACEK: And if you are listening to this and you have a boss that has downsides, I encourage you to really think about how you can manage the relationship with your boss to get exactly what you want from them and then push the rest aside. It's a skill that takes a lot of time in order to figure out what makes them tick and what makes them get you what you need.
But to my earlier point, you can't help that ship sink. They have to sink themselves. And while they're sinking, there are ways that you can get your work done and feel supported by managing up versus just waiting for them to manage correctly down.
JACK MONSON: Very well said.
[00:32:00] SCOTT GREENBERG: THE HEMS PROGRAM
JACK MONSON: Scott, let's go back to you. You have some things in the works with some of the franchise groups and franchisees you work with that you're rolling out that might help alleviate some of this bad leadership training. Tell us a little bit about that.
SCOTT GREENBERG: Yeah, I'm excited to talk about this. I first wanna acknowledge though that I'm a bit confused because Ali referred to a ghost as someone who's like never there. And Derrick described a Japanese ghost who's always there. So I really don't understand either way how ghost factors into the whole thing, but... another discussion.
So what I discovered when I wrote my last book, Stop the Shift Show, is that there is a big time shift show out there that people are just really struggling and especially in the franchise industry, that ultimately, you know, every brand agrees we need to give the customers the greatest experience. And that doesn't always happen because employees are not necessarily providing that experience. And I've come to believe that we have to hold employees accountable, but more often than not, employee performance is a direct reflection of how they're managed.
But I've also learned that very often management performance is a direct reflection of how those managers were managed. 'Cause if we're not getting formal management training, then all I have to go on is the people who managed us like as a role model, and sometimes it's a cautionary tale, but too often we just think, "Well, I guess that's what being a boss means." And so we pass on this legacy of bad management, but it's something that everybody's complaining about.
[00:34:00] HEMS: THE HOURLY EMPLOYEE MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
SCOTT GREENBERG: And so to answer that, I wrote Stop the Shift Show, but I wanted to go even deeper. So what I'll be formally announcing, although I've done a soft launch already, is I've created something called the Hourly Employee Management System. So it's accommodation, it's live trainings. It is a webinar series or it's a self-paced online course where there's five modules, quizzes at the end. You pass a final. If you get past that, you then have a certification. You're a HEMS hourly employee management system—a HEMS certified manager.
So I created it with the franchise industry in particular in mind. So franchisees can go through it, their managers can go through it. And the whole idea is what are some real world tactics to get to the human side of managing people. So it's really practical.
First it's about helping you understand your own management style and your biases, how you can expand that, understanding what culture is and what it isn't, how to build one. Great practices for hiring. You know, we talked about how we really don't leave a job, we leave a boss, right? Well, I think sometimes what attracts us to a job is the boss, is the culture. Now, why isn't that expressed more in our help wanted posts?
So I have a whole thing about how to create really great help wanted posts, and then have awesome interviews that kind of bring out the truth and let you compare people side by side and overcome your biases. Then there's a module that's on coaching employees for high performance and then something that's on motivation. So really practical. It's all the human stuff.
I've had a lot of franchisees, a lot of managers already go through it, and I'm so excited about the response and my goal is to really kind of be that partner for the franchise industry to help them fill this gap that most aren't filling, which is helping franchisees and their managers become better people managers so that their people can become great servants of customers.
JACK MONSON: I think this is so needed, Scott. There's so much training out there in every franchise system about how to make this or how to cook that or how to clean this, but how to deal with people is just—that's gotta be our biggest gap right now in franchising. So kudos on this idea, man.
SCOTT GREENBERG: Thanks. So I think it's the biggest opportunity.
[00:35:00] HEMS WEBSITE AND INFORMATION
SCOTT GREENBERG: So can I throw out the URL please? Or would that be cheesy?
JACK MONSON: Okay. No, please. We'll do it anyway. We're all about it here and I'll put it in today's show notes too. Give it to me.
SCOTT GREENBERG: Okay, so anybody can contact me. It's scottgreenberg.com or LinkedIn, but there's a promo page with all the information. It's called—so again, it's called HEMS, H-E-M-S, the Hourly Employee Management System. So the website is hemsworldwide.com.
JACK MONSON: Alright. Very good. We will check that out. Thank you my friend. And I feel like maybe we got some bad vibes out of us today talking about some of these things. Ali, you were saying that there is sort of this bonding that people have over bad bosses. So thank you all for sharing your stories today. I hope we feel a little relieved getting some of that back out.
[00:36:00] DERRICK'S CLOSING: INFLUENCE VS POWER
JACK MONSON: Derrick, I'm gonna throw it over to you for the last word.
DERRICK ABLEMAN: Well, thanks, Jack. I mean, I think this HEMS program is super exciting and it touches on the closer for me, which is, we've talked a lot about I think the differences between leaders and bosses and to me I think that's a tension between influence and power. And I've always preferred influence to power because to me, I think certain types of power become traps.
There's this Italian author named Italo Calvino and he has a short story collection called Under the Jaguar Sun, and it features a series of stories grounded in each of the five senses. And my absolute favorite story in this collection is called "The King Listens," and it's about a king who's a prisoner to his throne. Literally, he can't leave the throne because if he leaves the throne, he'll cease to be the king, and he can't remove his crown or lower his scepter for the same reason.
In fact, this king, he can't move at all for fear of being deposed or replaced or beheaded. And so all he could do is sit pinned to his throne and he's straining his ears, studying the clockwork sounds of the palace for any clues of any threats to his power or criticisms of his edict or plots against his person.
And ultimately, what he's listening for is an opportunity to escape the palace and shuck his crown once and for all. And so all kings are prisoners, I think in one way or another. So pity the king, pity the bad boss because they're stuck. They're trapped in this idea that they have about power, whether they know it or not.
[00:38:00] LEADERSHIP THROUGH EMPATHY
DERRICK ABLEMAN: But again, I've always preferred influence and I think that that's what leadership is about, because influence isn't dependent on hierarchy. It comes from empathy, like Scott was saying. And I think whether you're addressing the C-suite or the frontline, you have to be able to empathize with your audience if you want to turn them into collaborators, because that's what a leader does. A leader helps people want to want to do the thing that we are here to do, and that only works if you take the time necessary to understand another person beyond what they can do for you.
[00:39:00] CLOSING CREDITS
JACK MONSON: Thanks again to Ali Kraus, Danielle Wright, Derrick Ableman, Kristen Pechacek, and Scott Greenberg for joining us today, and thanks to our sponsors, Citrin Cooperman, Hughes, SSTA, and Franzy. And thanks to you for listening, telling a friend about us and staying connected on the Social Geek Radio network.