During your first year on the job, you’re eager to do well and so are particularly alert to clues about how people are accepted and promoted. As long as those practices don’t seem foolish or unethical, you try to adopt them. Often, the biggest lessons don’t come in a training session or a manual for new employees. The day your boss goes up in smoke over something you do—that is influential. The day you say something in a meeting and a stony silence comes over the group—that is influential. The day an older secretary pulls you aside and reads you the riot act—that is influential. The net result
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