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A mystique used to surround people who were in charge. I knew that to be put in charge of a group, business or sovereign country, a person met the highest standards and strictest credentials for stellar leadership and impeccable decision-making.
That illusion shattered the first time a boss put me in charge of a project.
"Me? What do I know about widgets?" I protested.
"Who says you need to know anything?" my boss said. "Just tell the people who do know how to get it done."
That made no sense -- which turns out to be the real qualification to be in charge. Actual knowledge and skill clog the cogs of leadership.
Which reminds me of a joke cousin Ollie once rattled off: A squirrel and a chipmunk walk into a candy store. The squirrel says, "Three o'clock." The chipmunk nods and says, "It was a rooster."
While my cousin guffawed at his own wit, I scratched my head. "Ollie, that makes no sense."
"Oh, yeah," he said. "I forget the part where the goose goes, 'The table has three legs.'"
Today, Ollie is in charge of some government agency that writes 350-page instruction manuals on how to fill out simple tax forms. Now I know why they read the way they do.
The Cousin Ollie / Peter Principle states that a worker rises to the level of his or her own incompetence to be placed in charge.
As a kid, I believed that Mom and Dad knew everything about anything. Otherwise, no one would have put them in charge of stupid little kids -- specifically me and my siblings.
Twenty-some years later, I called Mom when we brought my newborn daughter home: "The hospital people forgot to hand out the official 'Answers to All Possible Parenting Questions' guide. Can I borrow yours until mine comes in the mail?"
Between gales of laughter, Mom hooted, "Frank, come listen to what your son thinks we had."
I was shocked. They made it all up as they went? And I as the firstborn child became their experimental lab rat. There I was with a rat -- I mean, a little girl -- of my own, but no clue what to do.
"Yep, that's about the sum of it," Dad said.
At least the people who ran businesses where I worked knew what they were doing, right? I reassured myself with that delusion -- until I realized I had known some of these people since kindergarten.
"Wait, Freddy the Paste-Eater is in charge of the corporate budget? The kid so bad at coloring that not only did he not stay in the lines, he couldn't even stay on the paper is who's going to determine if we remain afloat?"
I would have jumped ship right then but the CEO of the other place was Devon the Alien, who didn't believe the earth was round. He wasn't a flat-earther, either. Devon the Alien believed Earth was shaped like a Pyrex measuring cup -- the 527 trillion-gallon size.
"That's what the government wants you to think, that Earth is a ball," Devon whispered to me on the playground. "But they're hiding all the flying saucers, time machines and Sasquatches in the Pyrex handle. You'll see. Wait until I run things."
"That'll never happen, Devon," I chuckled. But now he is.
Life was less frightening when I didn't know about the people in charge.
Take charge at burtseye view@tribtoday.com, the Burton W. Cole page on Facebook or www.burton wcole.com.