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It is something that many of us have had to deal with at some stage in our careers - the cry of "I hate my boss!"
They come in many forms - the overly critical type, the one that takes credit for your success, the manager who simply never offers praise for a job well done.
If you're unfortunate, you'll have been the victim of one who is all of the above.
A survey by TV Guide recently revealed The Simpson's Mr Burns to be the worst boss on television, with foul-mouthed chef Gordon Ramsay also making the list of bad managers.
While few people are likely to have been subjected to the comedic tyranny of the cartoon character or four-letter-word tirades of the Kitchen Nightmares star, they may have been subject to behaviour which is just a few degrees lower on the scale.
Self Belief.
Anyone who has worked for a tyrannical employer will know how difficult it is to survive the experience, let alone emerge triumphant.
Someone who has managed to have the last laugh when it comes to a bad boss is Nicky Chapman, best known for her role as a judge on reality TV shows Pop Idol and Popstars. In a recent interview with the Guardian, she spoke about her experience working as an Executive PA in the record industry.
"I could happily have continued doing that job; it opened lots of doors," she said.
However, her first employer was not particularly supportive.
"My first boss in the music industry told me I would never last, which really knocked my confidence," she revealed to the newspaper.
"A few years later he was asking me for a job."
Her advice for jobseekers was: "If you have self-belief and set your sights high, you can go very far."
Bad Management.
A recent survey by recruitment company Sharp Consultancy found that 100 per cent of people had experienced working for a difficult boss at some point in their careers, while 88 per cent said they had left their job because of a manager.
The research also revealed that 89 per cent of workers have had a disagreement with a manager and 67 per cent have made a complaint about their boss.
Mark Wilson, managing director of Sharp Consultancy, said the statistics suggest that management style often "leaves a lot to be desired".
So what do you do if you hate your boss?
Stay Organised.
Roy Lalor, head of training at Pitman Training in Swords,Co. Dublin, said that in the case of secretarial staff, being confident in what you are doing is key.
He explained that it is important for a secretary or Executive PA to stay on top of their workload and make sure they keep track of everything they are doing so that they give their boss as few opportunities as possible to criticise.
Training can help you to achieve the confidence and skills necessary to get the better of your boss, according to Mr. Roy Lalor.
He suggested that undergoing training in Microsoft Outlook could be one way to ensure you have the skills to succeed in a difficult environment.
Microsoft Skills.
"If you know how to keep Outlook diaries using the proper management tools then you're keeping track of everything, you're diarising and informed of what you're doing," Mr.Roy explained.
"Then they can see that you're organised, so if they are difficult or hard to manage, then you've got things documented so you can back up what you say," he added.
Mr. Roy said that knowing what the software can do for you and how it can help you in your day-to-day job is also important for staying on top of things at work when you are under scrutiny, which is where the knowledge acquired from Microsoft Office courses comes in.
Setting up databases or producing spreadsheets, for example, can enhance organisation and efficiency.
"If you've got Microsoft skills you can implement something, new changes, to make your day-to-day job easier," Mr. Roy commented.
"It's knowing what those applications can do for you, to reduce your time on specific tasks," he added.
Communication.
Skills learned on minute taking courses can also be useful for accountability, he said.
"When you're in a meeting, if you're confident you can take minutes, if your boss turns around to you and says 'no, that's not what I said', if you've got good shorthand skills you can show that they did," Mr Roy explained.
In addition, taking courses in communication can help to boost your knowledge and understanding of how to operate under pressure, suggesting that undertaking Pitman's Executive PA Diploma in Swords is a good way to develop these skills.
How To Step Into The Accounting And Finance Field.
Getting into the accounting, finance, bookkeeping field is quite a challenge as there so many routes to entry!
Most people begin by choosing to study for an AAT Accounting Technician course or an ACCA accounting qualification and while these are very worthwhile ways to start your journey, they are so popular that it makes it hard for students to stand out to employers looking to hire talented staff.
An Alternative Route.
An alternative route is to take a vocational rather than academic training programme and gain experience in a job before embarking on the academic route.
The argument (which is very persuasive) is that having real life experience enables students to get more deeply under the skin of accounting so that an academic study course has more contextual relevance should they take one later.
There is evidence to suggest that this approach is particularly appealing to management in a tight jobs market as they seek to hire staff who are able to work accurately with minimal supervision.
While the traditional approach, where employers would take academically trained students and subsequently put them on a practical
In particular, employers expect new hires to be able to use Excel and Sage Line 50 effectively and to have a firm understanding of the manual processes and procedures that underpin the use of these software applications.
Roy Lalor, Principal of the Pitman Training Centre in Swords confirms: “I’ve been delighted with how many of our students have recently got high status, well-paid work even though we hear the jobs market is flat.
And I think the word is getting round because we’re getting a lot of enquiries from ACCA and AAT students who have the right qualifications but no practical ability to use Sage Line 50.”
“Our training centre seems to be the busiest it’s been in ages and while not all our students want to become accounting technicians, everyone wants a certificate to prove they can use the relevant software.”
"It’s a similar story with payroll training. With the best will in the world, a business owner wouldn’t want to let somebody perform a payroll run unless they were convinced that the employee was certified as being competent to do so. It’s the same with the quarterly value added tax (VAT) return. In both cases, employers would demand the knowledge that the new hire knew what he or she was doing, having acquired the skills in a recognised institute or training centre."
Benefits To Students.
So with the emphasis firmly on vocational training, what are the benefits to students of taking this route?
Well, first of a vocational study course is usually of shorter duration than its academic counterpart.
Indeed, the Pitman Training
That means students can start looking for work much more quickly than academic learners.
And as Pitman Training is such a well-established name in education, it’s great to have it on your CV.
And finally, Pitman even offers finance to help you fund your studies.
So the message is that the traditional and obvious route to becoming an accountancy professional may not always be the most successful way to step into the accounting and finance field and it’s always worth exploring other related training options.
14/08/09
Learning How To Type Properly Is The Key To Avoiding RSI
Nearly all office workers are required to use a keyboard but the majority have never been trained to do so properly.
The outcome of this neglect is that thousands of people every year develop repetitive strain injury, a painful inflammation of the wrist, elbow or fingers that’s as painful as tennis elbow.
In addition, good typing skills enable you to type more quickly and accurately, resulting in higher productivity.
At Pitman Training we often meet people who think they are fast, accurate keyboard users who, on testing, often deliver 15 wpm of fewer once their errors have been corrected.
But learning to touch type, where the keyboard user no longer needs to look at either their fingers or the computer screen, is quite quick to learn.
And touch typing is a lifelong, transferrable skill, sought out by employers everywhere.
The average student requires as little as 25 hours of training in small bursts, to develop a true speed of 25 wpm.
Developing keyboard skills beyond 25 wpm requires a little more time and dedication but the payback is enormous in productivity and career development terms.
If you’d like to know more about learning to type properly, why not visit us for a free sample lesson?
15/6/09 Free Recruitment Service for Employers
Pitman Training Swords is delighted to announce a new free Recruitment Service for Employers in the North Dublin/Meath area.
Currently it can be very challenging for employers to try and recruit new staff. Images abound on news reports of queues stretching around blocks for jobs in supermarkets. Just trying to filter through the hundreds of applications for each job can be an administrative nightmare. Worse still, applicants may not have the keyboard skills or Microsoft Office packages that employers are looking for. Ninety per cent of employers today want office staff to have good typing and Microsoft skills.
Pitman Training Swords, part of the world's oldest and most famous training network, believes it may have the answer. Maria Lalor, training manager at Pitman Swords said "We have Accounts Technicians, Exec PA's, Microsoft Office Specialists, Medical/Legal secretaries graduating every month. Employers can come to us with a job specfor any office or admin position and we'll supply some top quality graduates from our database. It couldn't be simpler, qualified, experienced staff and no recruitment charges." Phone Maria at 01 8404075 for further details
Currently the service is only available in North Dublin Meath but there are plans to roll it out in other parts of the country since Pitman Training has fifteen branches in Ireland.
Contact Pitman Training Swords for a free training needs analysis of existing staff
25/4/08 Kidnapped
Terry Waite, Brian Keenan, John McCarthy and Ingrid De Betancourt have all been kidnapped and Ingrid De Betancourt remains in captivity. Hers is a particularly sad case. A Franco-Colombian former presidential candidate, she was captured six years ago during an electoral campaign and is now said to be suffering from hepatitis B and a tropical flesh-eating disease. I hope she comes home safely to her family. Perhaps the Colombian three could assist in locating her through their contacts with FARC. In a letter to her mother she described death as "the sweetest of my options"
Brian Keenan prayed for his own death while held hostage for four and a half years in the Lebanon during the late 1980's. He wrote a remarkable book about his experiences called "An Evil Cradling" One particularly chilling sentence described how his young Islamic Jihad captor's hero was Rambo. John McCarthy also wrote a book called "An Island Race" with Sandi Toksvig and produced a documentary of the same title.
The timelessness, powerlessness and feelings of wasted lives were at least caused for all of them by other people. Their only crime or fault was in being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sadly this resulted in a complete lack of control of their own destinies.
We, on the other hand, have complete control of our own lives. The only time we experience weightlessness or timelessness is probably in a swimming pool or on holidays. We may offer excuse to ourselves as to why we can't do something but there is usually no really good reason why the average person in reasonable health cannot achieve great things in their lives.
The person in a poorly paid or boring job can lift themselves our of the rut or make considerable changes to their lives just by taking some training. The only thing trapping most of us is fear of change.
I do hope Ingrid De Betancourt comes home.
T
5/4/08 Roy Keane for Taoiseach!
Fine gael need to move very quickly though. Niall Quinn is about to offer Roy Keane new terms at Newcastle and Roy Keane is also the only person likely to offer a realistic challenge to Brian Cowan at the next election. Keane is honest , principled, opinionated and charismatic in direct contrast to the current incumbent in Fine Gael.
Bertie Ahearn, our lost leader, has like a true Roman fallen on his sword brought down by a combination of lawyers and dodgy builders inside and outside the tribunals. We won't see his like again. And what of the tribunals themselves which seem to have taken on a life of their own. Like Jarndyce and Jarndyce in Charles Dicken's Bleak House, they look set to run for years and years gobbling up the estate in costs or perhaps even the whole state.
One thing is certain, the tribunals look set to need more and more lawyers and support staff as they go their merry way getting larger and larger. Legal Secretaries are obviously in great demand here with inexperienced juniors commanding starting salaries of €24,000 if they have a legal Secretarial Pitman Training Diploma.
28/3/08 Bill Cullen and Pitman
Last night I attended, somewhat reluctantly it must be said, the launch of the Fingal Business Network in Swords. This involved what my children refer to as a bit of banter and repartee and what others know as networking.
I'm not a great fan of networking, hence the reluctance, although being in business I realise it must be done. The Network was opened by Bill Cullen, businessman, writer and motivational speaker. After thirty years in education I'm the only motivational speaker I usally enjoy but Bill was very good.
During his talk he mentioned Pitman and the 'Tech'. It seems Bill attended Parnell Square Technical School in Dublin where he obtained shorthand and typing certificates from Pitman as it was then. Nice plug for the group! He was one of the few top business men who could type back in the fifties and sixties. I worked for the tech myself for nearly thirty years or CDVEC as it's now known.
I was wide awake by now and he remarked that he had been a member of Belvedere Youth Club, which was then confined to Dublin News Boys, where he learned boxing from a college member Anthony O'Reilly or 'Tone' as he affectionately referred to him. My children go there now and it's a pretty good school.
Bill Cullen's take on customer service was interesting. He believes in being nice to customers and staff. Every customer who visits a Renault garage is offered a cup of coffee and the staff discuss their likes and dislikes with them. Pitman Training ditto and helping the customer buy!
26/3/08 What am I worth?
I was watching this programme on RTE during the week. Natasha Milne is a single mum in her mid twenties living in Dublin with her two year old son Jacob. She works part time in a call centre and wanted to get a job as a PA working in event management.
She faced the usual dilemma, if she took a full time job she would lose her lone parent benefit and would have to pay for full time creche for her child. Things appeared to get worse then as she had to buy out her partner.
The presenter Lisa Holt was a recruitment consultant who went through the process of trying to find her a job. Lisa sent her to a colleague for a mock interview-always a good idea-and advised her on how to dress for it.
I was hopping up and down in the chair at this stage like the guy who knows the answer to the quiz question. The situation seemed to be crying out for a Pitman Training Exec PA Diploma which Natasha could have studied without stopping work. I was surprised that the presenter did not suggest some training or re-training but I may have missed that bit.
Because the Pitman Training method is flexible you can come any time you like so you don't lose time off work and you can fit it in around school times.
As it happens the story ended well since Natasha found a well paid job in a bank. It did highlight the difficulties faced by single mums in trying to get back into the work place. Pitman Training seems to me to be the ideal solution for people who need a part time, flexible solution to their learning requirements, built around their own personal timetable, and easily allowing them to study for ten or more hours per week.
Roy Lalor
21/3/08
I'm writing this blog in Pitman Training Swords on Good Friday and reflecting on the resignation of Eddie O'Sullivan the Irish rugby coach. Edddie was the most successful Irish coach of the modern era and should look back with satisfaction on what he achieved personally and for the team and country.
It's somewhat disquieting that the IRFU, having extended his contract before the world cup, appear to have succumbed to media pressure which at times rivalled the English tabloid press in pursuit of a premiership soccer manager. Sport and life can seem cruel at times.
It's not the only mistake the IRFU may have made this week. In spite of winning the Leinster Senior Cup in Rugby, Belvedere College SJ has no representatives on the Irish under 18 team and only one on the under 19 international team.
Eddie O'Sullivan is nothing if not resilient and I'm sure he'll bounce back helped, no doubt, by a generous package but it's not always so easy for a middle aged person faced with redundancy. Two companies locally have recently announced rendunancies, SR Technics and Wavin. My advice to anyone in these and other companies would be to get the Microsoft Office range of courses under their belt straight away. If you have Word, Access, Excel, Powerpoint and Outlook you're still very employable at any age! To mention another sporting legend, Mickey Whelan manager of All ireland Club Champions St Vincents is nearly seventy and is also studying for a PHD in Dublin City University. Life long learning how are you?
The office is quite busy this morning even though we are officially closed. Our Bebo consultant is setting up a new Bebo site for Pitman Training Swords. The Bebo consultant is, in fact, my 13 year old son Davy who is charging €20 for his time. It's interesting that someone so young has realised the value of his computer skills so soon. Davy has learned Computer Keyboard Skills as well as rugby in Belvedere College. In fact anyone of any age can learn Computer Keyboard Skills and it can be taken on-line at home or in the office. CKS would be invaluable for school or college students as so many projects and assignments need to be typed these days.
Roy Lalor
