We are so close to having a whole house again…it’s pretty amazing.

The sheet rock is up and the guys have started taping. The first coat is up, two to go before they start priming and painting. We may start seeing color on the walls as early as Saturday. It’s really pretty amazing.

Joe and Bob do just about everything (except the plumbing and electrical) and I think that’s one of the reasons the work is so sound. It’s like the McDonald’s theory of management – you have to work every job before you can be a manager. You have to know how to do everything. And that’s why a reasonable Mickey D’s manager won’t be yelling at the fry cook to get the fries out to the chunky lady in the sagging minivan. When you’ve done your time over the oil, you have an understanding of how long it takes. “Make them faster” is a ridiculous and, frankly, stupid statement.

I see it all the time where I work, and in just about every place I’ve ever worked. There are good managers who understand the realities of the work being done. They may not know how to do it all, but they have an understanding of what is involved. They properly manage their people and their people’s time. and they keep the wolves and clients at bay in the process. They run rings around the majority of managers out there…and that’s too bad.

Most managers, supervisors and yes, even executives with MBAs, have little understanding of the work at hand. In fact, they have little understanding of the business they are in. In the last 12 or so years I have worked for a number of companies in a variety of media outlets and I have had literally hundreds of clients from all ends of the spectrum – higher ed, fortune 500 corporate, banking and financial services, retail from mega giants to mom and pop stores. What I have found, across the board, is that the vast majorities of managers excel at few things more than underestimating their work force and failing to grasp what really motivates their employees.

Guys like Bob and Joe understand the whole gig, literally from the ground up, so they can do it all if need be. But they also know when to pass on a task and to whom the job should go. And they know when to bring in extra hands to get certain things done efficiently.

I’m not saying every managers needs to know how to do every specific task, nor am I suggesting that management need to take on more of the grunt work. On the contrary, managers serve an important purpose. But that purpose is not to simply yell at their people to work harder or figure out a way to get everything done with too little time (resulting in shoddy output) because that manager has a poor understanding of the realities of the job at hand.

I have actually been pretty lucky. I have never really had one of these schmucks directly over me. But I have had a lot of clients that fit this description, and I have had plenty of coworkers who do, too. And, of course, I have often been only a tier or two away from such people on the corporate food chain, so my work life has definitely been impacted.

Look America, we need to figure this stuff out. We need to lose our sense of entitlement. Our young people need to stop lusting after BMWs and start lusting after each other again. In other words, forget about the fancy car you schmucks – buy a beater and move out of your parents house!. Seriously, there are way too many managers out there and way too few people who can actually do shit. Can we please get that fixed?