Somebody posted this picture to a Peaches Records & Tapes page at Facebook yesterday. It’s taken in NYC during the early 1980s, in front of what eventually became the Strawberry Fields section of Central Park. The guy on the left, with the can in his hand, was the director of the Greensboro Peaches store when I worked there. And he was one of the best bosses I ever had.
His name is Jeff, and he was curmudgeonly and grouchy, which is something I relate to for some reason. I remember a girl named Cathy called him one day and said she wouldn’t be in, because she was too “stressed out” to work. Jeff said, “Just imagine how stressed out you’re going to be tomorrow when you’re applying for unemployment.” Ha! We need more guys like him in charge.
He also informed me I was getting fat at some point, and needed to cut back on the Twinkies, or whatever. “Your fat ass is bad for business!” he “joked.” It was a simpler time…
And we had a bin near the front door where we offered cassettes and LPs, 2 for $10. Or sometimes 3 for $10. Each month a different record company was featured there, and whenever it was almost time for CBS (now Sony), I placed the order for the product.
One time I got a little fancy with it, a little cute, and ordered 25 copies of The Best of Bill Withers on cassette. His big hit “Lean on Me” had been remade and was all over the radio again. I believed I could sell a bunch of those sumbitches, because the original version of the song was included. Usually I just went with all the early Aerosmiths and “Bat Out of Hell” and the first two Boston albums… I did that too, to a lesser degree, but was also trying to be creative.
Yeah, and when all those tapes arrived Jeff almost had an aneurysm. He kept yelling at me, “Are you under some kind of duress?? Fucking Bill Withers?! Oh my god, my head’s going to explode!! Help me understand what’s going on here!” He went full Sam Kinison on my ass, but I was convinced I’d prove him wrong. I still believed I’d made the right call.
And you can probably guess what happened… I think we sold one copy during the entire month. We had to return 24 tapes, which went against the store’s return allowance. It was an unforced error, and he never stopped bringing it up to me. “Bill Withers…” he’d mumble, and shake his head in disgust.
His use of the word “duress” during that receiving dock meltdown killed me. I don’t know why, but it still makes me laugh. His eyes were bugging out of his head he was so pissed. “Are you under some kind of duress??”
So, yeah. He was gruff and plainspoken, but he was also a hell of a good guy, and a great boss. He could tell I was into it, and spent extra time with me, teaching me about the music industry, etc. By the time I moved on I was a manager and buyer and even wrote the radio ads for the store. He had me involved in everything, and it boosted my confidence and prepared me for my future job at Warner/Elektra/Atlantic.
He didn’t hesitate to tell me when I’d screwed up (in fact, I think it brought him great joy), but he seemed to believe in me. That’s no small thing, and is fairly rare. Most people can’t be bothered, one way or the other. Jeff put some effort into developing a few of us who showed promise, and it was a big deal for me. It changed my life in certain ways.
We’ve talked about our worst bosses here many times, but I’d like to invite you to tell us about your best bosses today. Why were they the best? Use the comments link to bring us up to date on it.
And I’m going to call it a day, my friends.
Have yourselves a great weekend!
Support us by doing your shopping at Amazon! In Canada? Here’s your link. Thank you guys!
My best boss was my last boss, he did not micromanage, and gave you, in advance, the okay to use the P card as we saw fit to get a job done for the customer. Prior bosses treated that p-card like it was their last penny, and buying anything had to be run past them first. Sure made life easier when you could just do what you needed to do to get the job done.
Jeff also tops my list for best boss. You are correct about him: Jeff was gruff and plainspoken, but he was a good guy … and a damn great boss. Cheers to ya, Jeff!!! And to you, Mr. Surf Report. You were a stellar co-worker.
We had a pretty good crew at Peaches during that stretch. It would have been a great job if we didn’t have to deal with the public.
I’m in total agreement with the post and Brad’s sentiments. I enjoyed my one and only trip to Jeff’s house for a managerial celebration of the holidays.
Best boss? The one I’m still having lunch with once a month after he left for greener pastures … in 2009.
Some people ‘got it,’ managerially, and some don’t. He does, and is a good guy to boot.
I, for the record, do not. I’ll cry about it tomorrow.
My first boss out of nursing school was probably my best. If it was the middle of the night and we got crazy busy, if you called her she would come. She might show up in a nightgown (with scrubs in hand), but she came. Too many managers aren’t willing to do what they ask others to do. I worked a crazy amount of overtime for her, I guess because I respected her and knew she would work as hard as we did.
Bill Withers –
You were just looking out for a fellow West Virginian.
My best bosses have always been the ones that let me do my work with minimal supervision, but would let me come to them with questions when I felt like I should not make an executive decision without consultation. Probably the best would be the advisers I was lucky enough to have during the two post-doc research stints I did years ago.
My best bosses were a lesbian couple who owned the restaurant where I waitressed, starting in 1990. So much laughter every day, all day long. On Saturday nights after closing, we’d have game night. All of us that worked there…only 4 of us…and some neighbors would come and we’d be playing until the sun came up. They told me I’d have to fuck up pretty bad and probably 3 or 4 times to get fired. When my husband got laid off, we didn’t have to worry about feeding the kids. I was already getting fed after hours every night, just as part of my job. It was the best job I ever had and I’m still friends with one of the gals.
The dismal turnout of comments on this topic leads us to believe bosses in general are shit. Poor bosses, they can’t help it.
As the brown noser cycle perpetuates, those who are climbing the corporate tower just have browner noses, so you eventually end up with good bosses far and few between.
I had a LPO (leading petty officer) in the Navy who grew up in Germany during WW2. He was too young for the Hitler youth rubbish but old enough to have lived through some serious crap. He was the most even-tempered dude that I have ever met. No smugness, no bullshit. He patiently taught us how to maintain our machinery and all he required was that we take our jobs seriously and not just “mail it in.” That was a long tme ago. Since then, every boss has been a variation of one of the knuckleheads on “The Office.” One of my last bosses’ favorite pep-phrase was “there are no problems, just opportunities for excellence.” She said while grinning like a death pumpkin. It still creeps me out.
My current boss (let’s call him “Greg”) is a pretty cool guy. Always mellow, and in the 14 years I’ve known him, I have never once heard him raise his voice. I can only tell he’s stressed if he gets a regular Coke from the vending machine instead of diet. He’s been through multiple bouts of melanoma, yet it doesn’t seem to phase him each time the doctors tell him there’s more. He just rolls with it. It’s kind of amazing, and I strive to be like that when I grow up.