Jesse Goldman

Jesse is responsible for marketing at Rypple. Jesse was one of the early team members at Endeca where he contributed to its growth in a variety of ways, including as co-founder of the EMEA operation and head of retail industry marketing. Jesse plays piano, is an aspiring golfer, and used to play lots of baseball, including for the Canadian Junior champions. Jesse holds a BA from Harvard.

• Me

  Mah boss from Atlaana is terrible!

• http://twitter.com/heatherpayne Heather Payne

  I’ve been really lucky – all of the bosses I’ve had have been pretty great. My first boss (when I worked at McDonald’s in high school) significantly contributed to my growth and development. I learned a ton, especially after being promoted to management at 16 years old. He really helped make me into the leader I am today.

• http://LeanHRBlog.com Dwane Lay

  I’ve worked with good and bad, but I had one boss that has turned me off from sales for life.

  I was once the youngest member of a sales team, and was very good at pimping the program of the month.  In one major push, I had more customers enrolled than anyone else.  My boss asked me in front of the room what I was doing, and I shared a very simple approach of getting customers engaged who would clearly benefit from the program.  His response was a very dismissive, “Well, but after that, you don’t have any idea what to do, I guess?” 

  He knowingly sent me in to poach orders from another one of our stores.  He told me everything was set up.  That was a lie.

  Once, we were working with a team of 10 on an out of town project, and he told me (not asked me) to give him my keys so he could go pick up lunch for everyone.  His car was parked next to mine.  Mine was a new (to me) Mustang convertible that I loved dearly.  That was the first time I let him know in no uncertain terms that we were not friends, it was not ok, and he should consider other alternatives. 

  The final encounter came when I was finishing my degree, and had a final exam on a Wednesday evening.  He had planned a client meet and greet for the same night.  I let him know I couldn’t attend due to the school conflict.  (The company was paying for that school, by the way, and had always been very supportive of my education.)  He let me know I should skip the exam, and should further “get my priorities straight.”  I responded, “I think I just did.”

  I resigned the next day.  And never looked back.  True story.

• http://rypple.com Jesse Goldman

  Dwane, it’s amazing how helpful horrible bosses can be in reminding us of our priorities (even if it takes some time to figure that out). On a related note, as a former Mustang owner, I’m with you 100% – that move would have pushed me over the line too!

• http://www.royceassociates.com Joanne Royce

  Here’s my story of two great bosses I’ve had the pleasure of working with and why I feel that way.
  http://www.royceassociates.com/what-makes-a-great-leader/

• Anonymous

  In the mid-1990′s the software company where I worked hit a bad patch, and layoffs were inevitable. I was OK, but friend a good friend was cleaning out his desk in the cube just across from mine. The Bad Boss comes by, chats him up a little, and does the “wish you well” kind of thing. Then he asks, “is that cell phone yours or the company’s?” My friend tells him it’s the company’s and he’ll be turning it into IT at the end of the day. The Bad Boss suddenly lights up, grabs the charger off my friend’s desk and says “great, I need another charger for my phone. Thanks.” He turns and leaves with the charger, and we just stare in disbelief.

• http://rypple.com Jesse Goldman

  So did the bad boss advance because they were also very enterprising? (just kidding – it’s amazing how insensitive people can be, especially in work environments. that story really is hard to believe)

• Pingback: Disrespectful bosses | Aggoman

• http://www.facebook.com/kandies4you Dawn Busch

  I’m posting a little late but since I just saw this I felt I needed to reply.  I’ve had both.
   
  Great bosses are really hard to come by. They are usually, from my experience, the ones that have started at the bottom and worked their way to manager by actually DOING the work. They were just handed the position.  Great bosses also tend to be people oriented as well as business oriented. They are free with their knowledge because they are secure in who they are. Always willing to take even 2 minutes to explain or answer a question.
   
  Hard to deal with bosses are ones that think their decisions are the only ones, even though one day they make a decision and the next decide it isn’t the right one so it’s “your” fault, as if YOU made the decision.  They micromanage and don’t let employees use the skills that they have, especially when they have no skills in that area. Basically always placing blame elsewhere but being the first to take the kudos for something someone else did.