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a boss that will use it and pass it off as his own idea in private, which gives him the upper hand, publicly state your plan in detail so that no one is in doubt about where the plan came from.

Moving on from this, teaching a boss to have original ideas of his own not only helps you in enjoying your workplace, but improves the working lives of those around you. What the boss failed to grasp in the way of people power can be taught to him by an employee that cares sufficiently to educate him on the merits of recognition of effort.

One boss that I had was always using other people's ideas and calling meetings at which he would announce them. Little by little, he was alienating his workforce, and the effect of this was that instead of pulling together as a team, the team were gradually falling apart. He was the team captain that wanted to score all the goals on his own and didn't recognize that without his staff, he wouldn't be in a position of being able to score. Teaching him the value and strong points of each member of staff, whilst making the guy feel good about himself, built up his confidence. People that steal ideas don't have the confidence that they need and are often shallow in their thoughts.

Little by little, what we did was demonstrate that teamwork was beneficial to the company and that recognition of ideas was part and parcel of the process, and that the occasional slap of a back for coming up with good ideas was far better to the morale of the workforce than becoming a team leader with no team behind them. To my mind the solution lies with the employee, and an intelligent employee can make a difference. Putting personal issues aside, and confronting them with a reality check on how their methods work, balanced against how yours do is a superb way forward because they like stealing ideas and will think that the incentive of recognition of ability was their idea in the first place.

I can run circles around human beings that don't give recognition where recognition is due and the way to learn this skill is to watch behavior patterns, learn what these people are doing wrong, and feed them ideas that improve the way in which they behave in a manner that makes them think it was their idea.

Go for it. Ideas people are valuable people and using your ideas to improve your bosses thinking are easier than you think. Who wins ? You do every time, because at the end of the day you achieve what you set out to achieve, and gain recognition for your skills.

Learn more about this author, Rachelle de Bretagne.
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