The Rules of Management, 3rd Edition

RULE 94

Be above interdepartmental warfare

I once worked for two bosses at the same time. They were two directors of the company and they hated each other. Each had an agenda. Each fought a vicious campaign against the other with us managers – and staff – as their foot soldiers, pawns, cannon fodder. It wasn’t pleasant. They had their own areas of responsibility and if you worked solely in any such area you were happy, because you had one boss. But if you, like me, had to cross over frequently from one director’s area into the other’s, then life was made intolerable.

The two directors countermanded each other’s orders, played dirty tricks on each other, wouldn’t speak to each other and generally behaved like very small children. I learned, ...