The One With the Temp

It's amazing how you have to change your way of thinking when you manage someone. I have managed many consultants at this job, but that's not the same as having someone in your office working for you. I had such an experience for the first time this week. I hired a temp to work on a database for an event we have coming up. I've been monitoring him, checking his work, telling him when he can go to lunch and all that, but what I didn't realize is how literally he would take everything I said.

I told him that he needed to call every person in the database to confirm that they were still at their office. I thought that was a good instruction until Gunther came in and told me, "Um, the temp just called and said, 'I was just calling to confirm that Arnold Swartzenegger was still the governor of California.'" Oops. I guess I should have told him that he didn't have to call EVERYONE. :)