Q. How do you walk that line
between Jekyll and Hyde?
For example, if we go to a
happy hour, I might be hanging out with all the folks or we
have softball games and everyone lets their hair down a little
bit. That’s Manik the CEO promoting a good time.
But, then it comes to a meeting, and there is someone sitting there, and maybe they’re
not as attentive. I call them out
right there on the carpet in
front of everyone. That’s nothing personal; that’s Manik the
businessman.
So, they can’t play that just
because we went out last
night, you can sit in a meeting
and not give your 110 percent.
That’s sort of the two hats I have to wear at times, and
that’s the danger, that’s the pitfall of being flat-lined and at
that level.
Some CEOs say, ‘You didn’t
do (something), you’re going
to be reprimanded.’ My thing
is, I want to show them why
and how we got here.
Q. How do you address
someone who isn’t living up
to standards?
Management comes in to
me, and those are heads of
departments … but because
we are flat-lined, there is
always room for my interaction along the lines with a
[project manager] if someone missteps, and it depends
what the misstep is.
If it’s something that violates company policy or our
practices manual, it’s treated
a certain way from HR. If it
violates maybe the culture
we’re in — hyper-responsiveness — it’s, ‘Hey, you didn’t
call the client back, or you
weren’t being responsive to
a certain issue.’
There are evaluations done
at the end of each year. We
are trying to move that to a
quarterly basis and say, ‘OK,
here are your goals,’ because
we forget. Wherever they
misstep, we want to come
back and revisit that in an
evaluation that, ‘OK, you
were able to clear that up.’
But, when I sit down with
someone, it’s really going
backward and saying, ‘What
are our fundamental core
principles here, and can you
continue to function, or did
we overpromote you into
something you’re not ready
for?’
HOW TO REACH: Arora Engineers Inc., (610) 459-7900 or www.aroraengineers.com
