Share at least one example of the worst impression management mistake that you have seen made by another. Discuss how the mistake affected your perception of the person. The worst impression management mistake that I have seen was by a manager at my last job (bookstore). I worked for the company for almost 5 years and watched the way my manager played favorites and then denied it every time. It was on a daily occasion when I went into work that I would watch as my manager stood around with several of the male employees and one female employee talking sports. When I first started working there the female employee was a “lead” who delegated tasks to the associates and she was similar to my manager in the sense that they would have ‘favorites’ and would stand around talking and not being productive but as soon as they started walking around and saw two co-workers talking those employees would be yelled at and told to ‘get back to work’. I lost respect for the manager and lead because they created a halo effect atmosphere in the workplace; if any employee didn’t want to work hard all they had to do was talk sports, which was the attribute the manager and lead used to develop an overall impression of a person (Uhl-Bien, p. 58). This resulted in tasks not getting done is a timely manner, the floor looking messy and unorganized and several disciplinary meetings telling the staff to work harder and deny favoritism.
What did you learn from the impression management mistake that you described? I learned that in that kind of work environment everyone needs to be treated equally otherwise there will be unfair advantages for part of the staff and resentment from the rest of the staff.
How did that perception influence your behavior toward that person?
I still treated my manager and lead with respect since they were my superiors even though there was still resentment.