My boss

Imagine being a male fresher. Imagine having a female boss. Imagine having a major fight with her ending with her red teary eyes and you arrogantly asking her to take the matter higher up if she wanted to. Imagine the allegation being the use of abusive language and a lack of respect. Sounds like the perfect setup for a pink slip? Well, it won me one of my best friends.

I am one of those few fortunate or unfortunate people who has always had a female boss. And not one, but four, one after the other over my three years of work experience. They have ranged from lady-hitlers to smart managers to friends.

This lady who is the subject of my current post initially joined our team as a team member. She had a pretty face, a sweet smile and bright, shiny eyes. My immediate reaction was cynical and typical of me at the time. I concluded that she obviously would do no work and was just a placeholder in the team. To top it she was married. A real waste!

At that time our team was being led by one of those who could easily classify as a lady-hitler. To put it plainly this lady-hitler could get work done. We worked extremely hard for months including weekends to meet the deadlines but when I, in my usual blunt style, asked her for a 'comp-off' she simply replied that she herself had personally never asked for a 'comp-off'. I did eventually manage to get what I wanted but it left me with an inherent distaste for female bosses and supervisors in general. Incidentally, the only thing I liked about her was that she had made the pretty lady work hard as well.

A stroke of good luck freed us from our lady-hitler when she got herself transferred to another location for some personal reasons. But strokes of good luck must be followed by bad ones since I guess even God has his/her balance sheet to draw up each year and assets must balance liabilities! So the pretty lady was chosen as our next supervisor.

The whispers in the air told us she had probably not been a project lead before. Time to take the upper hand! (Remember the eternal tale of the new governess and the naughty kids?)

So I was plain biased towards the pretty lady. I have always been naturally a bit rude or rough in temperament. That day, I gave her a horrible frown and asked her harshly for some information which she had taken a little long to provide. She lost her temper. I don't blame her. I had been a bit of a thorn for sometime. Technically I hadn't said anything offensive but my tone had said enough. She told me off angrily that I was rude and lacked respect and how dare I behave so badly. I was in the wrong but I felt unusually stubborn and retorted angrily. Words led to more words and I took the stand that since I could not talk properly she could henceforth communicate with me by text only.

So for the rest of the day I tried a cold war. But she came to reason with me again. This time, I was even more rude and asked her to take up the issue with higher ups if she wanted but I simply couldn't work with her. But I had gone a bit too far. With red teary eyes she told me no one had ever behaved like this with her in her whole life. The words ring in my years even now, so strong was their impact. Something broke inside me. I tendered an immediate apology. I have tried to analyze what happened to me all of a sudden but I have found no answer. It definitely wasn't fear for I have rarely been scared of anyone barring myself. Was it because of the pretty face in tears? I don't think so for at that time I was still very cold deep inside.

It was a Friday and during the weekend I sent her an apology by sms. I wasn't feeling all right. I was in the wrong. I knew it. I hated having to admit it.

Throughout the whole of Monday I only communicated with her through mails and barely spoke. In the evening she again called me. I sat down in front of her and hung my head. She asked me what I intended to do. I simply said that I had apologized to her and I had been on my best behaviour all day. She said she didn't care about any apology. She just wanted me to be normal and realize where I had gone wrong. I replied that she couldn't have both. I could either be the perfect professional or my usual rough self, not somewhere in between. "As you wish." was all she said. She never went to higher ups. She would fight her own battles.

Over the next few weeks, things somehow changed because of a few little things she did. I used to always complain about the terrible food in the canteen on weekends. So one Saturday, she cooked some stuff along with her usual Tiffin for the rest of us. The work was always pressing and one Saturday her creche matron refused to keep her one year old kid, so she got a special permit and brought him to office. It was then that I realized the amount of effort that she had been putting in to balance work with looking after the baby. She gradually but surely won my confidence to the extent that I began to trust her even on my personal matters. I became my naughty self again though with no longer the need to be rude. She was a boss who cared. She has since become one of my best friends and one of the very few people I trust.

As I look back now I realize that those who really look beyond the facade that people present to others are the ones who understand others the best. She is one such person. She could see right through me. Even on little matters. One particular case comes to mind. The smokers at office typically took long breaks because they just had to smoke while I had no such excuse. So I convinced her that I had taken to smoking as well. I had thought myself smart till long after I had left her project, she let me in on a secret. "I know you don't smoke. I always knew you were lying!".