Many problems at work can be solved with one simple idea:

Your boss is your best, most important customer.

A huge percentage of the chaos created when working on any team in any institution stems from the broken parts of the relationships between those of higher and lower status in the organization.

Here are some commonplace, poorly informed attitudes and maladapted behaviors that can be observed in almost any corporation...

• Bosses are considered caretakers who give you an allowance (that is, your pay) as your parents may once have done. They are responsible for the most profound matters affecting the organization. They make the rules, keep order, and tell you what your roles and responsibilities are. If things are not to your liking, the bosses are who you complain to. They are the "big people."
• If two employees or teams are not producing effectively together, they fight or compete. While competing, they plead, demand, or hint that the boss must resolve the conflict by deciding who is right and who is wrong. This is known as "escalation."
• Bosses are expected to be the primary if not the exclusive source of leadership. If you or your teammates are coming up short in some part of your results, you point to a leadership deficit somewhere in the power structure above you. Even if you are the CEO, you can blame the Board of Directors for your lack of power or results. If you are a Board Member, you can blame the government, the Executives, or the weather.
• Bosses decide what is acceptable and what is not. They are responsible for "reorgs" and negotiate amongst themselves to decide who works on what. They decide what organizational structure or strategy will do best in the market. These decisions change continuously, usually in parallel with job changes at their own level. Bosses order projects, describing to employees what they want, when it should be delivered, and how much money is to be spent.
• A lot of time is spent making proposals to and seeking the permission of bosses. Certainly, every new thing of consequence finds its way to a boss for approval.

A Better Way

It is more effective to demystify the authority figures and to use a more functional model for guiding relations among bosses and subordinates.

Bosses are customers of their employees. They give employees money, and the employees provide services in return. In exchange for their compensation, teams of employees create solutions to things considered problems by the boss, work to make the boss look great, and do their utmost to ensure that the boss makes great money and attains other goodies because of his or her teams' great results. The teams require as little from the bosses as possible. Any extra benefits offered by the boss-such as health insurance, awards, bonuses, formal or informal flex time, or telecommuting opportunities-are greeted with appreciation because they are often above and beyond the employer's strictest responsibility to employees. The relationship is viewed as adult-to-adult and customer-to-service provider.

Your bosses may participate as much or as little as they like in projects. Your first duty as an employee is to make them ecstatically happy customers who see you as a great service provider. Your goal is simple: make sure that they are happy with you, glad to pay you, and maybe even that they seek to find other ways to say thanks for your service.

Teams reorganize themselves as needed to solve problems for bosses in the most effective means possible. This is done efficiently with no cost to the bosses.

If you are in a situation where all or most of your paycheck comes from or via one boss, that makes that boss your most important customer.

Jim and Michele McCarthy Jim and Michele left successful leadership positions at Microsoft to form an innovative teamwork laboratory. For the last 10 years they have rigorously studied and codified the *best practices* for teams to get into and maintain a state of shared vision. These best practices are called The Core Protocols. Jim is well-known for his humorous, inspirational and educational public speaking and the couple are co-authors of the books Dynamics of Software Development and Software for your Head. They also co-host a podcast focused on business issues called The McCarthy Show which some claim is addictive. They can also be heard on Microsoft's MSDN web site.

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