Hi all, I have indeed been deluged with responses, although the majority seem to have gone to the whole list. I will type up a nice little summary and send it out next week, so no need to keep going for my sake...but don't let that stop you if this topic is of interest. Cheers! Laura Laura Ruttum Manuscripts Specialist, Manuscripts and Archives Division New York Public Library [log in to unmask] [log in to unmask] Sent by: Archives & Archivists <[log in to unmask]> 07/13/2006 03:06 PM Please respond to [log in to unmask] To [log in to unmask] cc Subject Have your cake and eat it too [was improving staff morale] Hey, Mark, there is no right way to cut a cake as far as I'm concerned. The only thing I say is, I hope no one does what I once saw a woman do at an office party, lick the frosting off the knife as it accumulated -- and then simply continue cutting. Eeeewwwwww. I'll have to remember to "cut it wrong," as Mark did, next time I do it, sounds like a nice way to get out of cutting the cake (why should the B=day person be doing all the work, anyway!) I understand what you're saying, Conni, but haven't most of us been saying there's no one size fits approach? Hey, some of us even like junk food, much to our chagrin :-) And of course, food and social events and treating people with respect and providing a quality work environment need not be mutually exclusive. Most of the messages haven't been very prescriptive, at least in my view, they seem just a sharing of anecdotes. for the most part. Hey, by the way, I bet there are guys out there who are better cooks than I am, I'm pretty middling. The best boss I ever had was Fred Graboske, a Vietnam veteran, someone with inherently good people skills who did wonders in keeping our morale up under trying circumstances at NARA. Really a cool guy, I respect him enormously to this day! He did it mostly by taking the time to talk to AND listen to his subordinates, to consider what they told him, etc. And to assign work fairly, treat people well, etc. He did what is called "management by walking around," which included enough non-work related chit chat to get to know his staff. Come to think of it, while I worked for Fred, we also set up a dart board and some of the staff threw darts during lunch time. And played Trivial Pursuit in the lunchroom. (Now I'm really revealing how old I am!) I hope some of the other guys on the List have sent Laura some Off List suggestions about what they do to motivate their subordinates; or what they've observed good bosses doing. Fred doesn't subscribe to this List but I'm sure there are some Fred types out there. Well, maybe not exactly like Fred, LOL. Laura, do let us know if you have enough or if you or others want us to keep discussing this on the List. Although I love the topic (ya think?), I'm somewhat leery of the discussion going on for a long time, even though it is work related (the list is an open forum so you never know when someone is going to shout shut up, enough already, yikes.) Maarja ________________________________________________________________________ Check out AOL.com today. Breaking news, video search, pictures, email and IM. All on demand. Always Free. A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List sponsored by the Society of American Archivists, www.archivists.org. For the terms of participation, please refer to http://www.archivists.org/listservs/arch_listserv_terms.asp. To subscribe or unsubscribe, send e-mail to [log in to unmask] In body of message: SUB ARCHIVES firstname lastname *or*: UNSUB ARCHIVES To post a message, send e-mail to [log in to unmask] Or to do *anything* (and enjoy doing it!), use the web interface at http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/archives.html Problems? Send e-mail to Robert F Schmidt <[log in to unmask]> A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List sponsored by the Society of American Archivists, www.archivists.org. For the terms of participation, please refer to http://www.archivists.org/listservs/arch_listserv_terms.asp. To subscribe or unsubscribe, send e-mail to [log in to unmask] In body of message: SUB ARCHIVES firstname lastname *or*: UNSUB ARCHIVES To post a message, send e-mail to [log in to unmask] Or to do *anything* (and enjoy doing it!), use the web interface at http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/archives.html Problems? Send e-mail to Robert F Schmidt <[log in to unmask]>