Great lessons in how to manage people and workplace situations often arise by observing people who are very, very bad at managing people and workplace situations. When one of those people soils the bed in public 💩, we’ve got a ready-made morality tale.
Elon Musk, tantrum-throwing toddler and Twitter’s top twit, dropped such a gift when he publicly mocked one of his employees, Haraldur Thorleifsson, deriding the man’s work ethic, competence and judgment in a series of tweets.
Thorleifsson had the nerve to ask Musk — after repeated direct questions to Twitter’s HR chief and Musk himself went unanswered for almost two weeks — whether he still had a job because his company laptop had gone dark after a wave of 200-some Twitter layoffs.
Who is this Thorliefsson character?
- He goes by Halli, is 45 years old, and he’s won several person of the year awards in Iceland, his homeland, as well as the Icelandic order of chivalry
- In 2014 he founded Ueno, a creative agency with expertise in product development and marketing that worked for Twitter, Google, Medium, Facebook, Reuters, ESPN, Walmart and other big brands
- In 2021, he sold Ueno to Twitter and chose to have his selling price paid to him in wages so he could be taxed at a higher rate (this would put more tax money in Iceland’s coffers, benefiting healthcare and education for his fellow citizens)
- He ran the innovation team that created Communities on Twitter
- He has a form of muscular dystrophy, must use a wheelchair, and has difficulty using his upper body, arms and hands
Intriguing guy. The kind of person you’d want in your company. The kind of guy other employees likely admire and respect.
Here are Thorliefsson’s tweets of last resort to Musk, followed by a few of Musk’s shockingly inappropriate tweetbacks.
Yes, Musk even tweeted a clip of the Bobs from “Office Space” at Thorliefsson, douchiest of douche moves.
Of course, it’s glaringly obvious that a) you don’t talk about personnel matters out in the open, let alone on Twitter for the entire world to see, and b) you don’t mock the physically challenged.
But that’s not our lesson today. If you actually need to learn the aforementioned, you’re not fit to run a lemonade stand let alone a multibillion-dollar company.
Rather, our takeaway from this debacle — be curious, not judgmental.
(Apologies, Ted Lasso.)
Most of us have a tendency to defend when confronted with an unpleasant accusation. We also tend to make assumptions and believe we know more about a situation than we actually do. Not only does Musk fall into this trap, he goes full-asshole mode on Thorliefsson.
Be curious, not judgmental reflects a mindset that could serve you well, whether you’re a small-team manager or a big-time CEO.
When faced with a situation that seems to adversely affect your people and/or your business operations and/or your reputation, you need the discipline to do two things:
- ask questions and gather information
- avoid snap judgments and quick reactions — which usually are driven by bias and emotion, not facts
In other words, be curious, not judgmental.
Let’s assume this kerfuffle took place within the confines of Twitter HQ in private conversations and not in dozens of tweets read by millions of people. What would you do?
Gather essential facts from your key team members: Who is Halli Thorliefsson? What does he do for us? Did we actually cut his job and not tell him? Is he good at his job? Did anyone receive his previous private messages? If so, why did we not respond?
After asking all the questions, figure out how to respond.
Meet with the aggrieved party — in person if possible, or via video chat in our far-flung, remote workplaces. In private. No texts, no Slack notes, and no exchanges in the office for others to overhear or witness.
After making an arse of himself via tweet, Musk eventually did get on a video call with Thorliefsson, apologized publicly, threw his own team under the bus by saying he’d received inaccurate info, and offered Thorliefsson his job back. But the damage was done.
Fix the phrase be curious, not judgmental in your mind. Develop this as a personal habit or discipline.
This is how you respect your team, yourself, and your company’s mission. Make this the way you work and you’ll never look as douchey as Elon Musk.
Dennis has managed news operations and journalists for almost three decades. That’s a bit like herding cats — jungle cats. 🦁
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