IN some corners of the corporate jungle, there exists a rare but persistent bird. It doesn’t perch. It dive-bombs. With puffed-up feathers and Wi-Fi access, it flaps through the organizational chain of command like a tangled strand of decorative tinsel — looping in the highest-ranking lifeforms on copied emails while ignoring the people tasked to do the job.
Protocols? Optional. This bird flutters straight to the top — over, around, and through everyone else — then acts surprised when morale collapses. Or worse, when the people it bypassed start replying with passive-aggressive one-liners like, “Noted with thanks” and “As mentioned in my earlier email.”
Let’s be honest, we’ve all committed a protocol sin. I’ll admit I’ve jumped the chain twice or more — usually when someone’s dilly-dallying and I’m chasing a deadline. But here’s the thing, you pick your battles. You don’t play all your aces on a pending staple wire request. If you escalate every minor inconvenience, your credibility declines faster than your unopened HR reminders.
Which brings us to one of corporate life’s most misused tools: the CC button.
The CC button was meant for transparency. For shared awareness. For, you know, actual relevance. What it has become is a digital panic room — a place where people hide their insecurities behind subject lines and signatures, CC-ing the entire org chart and blind-copying guilt. Because nothing screams “empowerment,” like copying your boss, your boss’s boss, and the ghost of your onboarding trainer from five years ago.
This isn’t leadership. It’s insecurity in font size 11.
Some call it initiative. Others call it skipping manners class — now dressed in semi-formal slacks. Because when people start skipping steps and skipping people, what’s really on display isn’t urgency. It’s ego.
And ego, when left unchecked, forgets humility.
Humility used to be a leadership virtue. Now, in certain team huddles, it’s as extinct as punctuality. A title or office royalty becomes an invisibility cloak for basic courtesy. Suddenly, people start using verbs like “cascade” and “escalate” instead of real conversation. You hear emails that go, “Kindly advise concerned parties,” and know you’ve lost all hope of ever being addressed by your first name again.
And then there’s respect — that thing people love to demand but forget to give.
Respect isn’t owed. It’s earned. It has nothing to do with your job grade, tax bracket, SUV make, or, worse, the brand of your bag. You respect not because of someone’s title, but because it’s the right thing to do — to the janitor, the intern, the barista, even the courier who somehow manages to smile after climbing six floors with zero elevator access.
And while we’re talking respect, we can stop making the workplace a tribunal for what people wear, how they speak, or who they are. When did performance reviews turn into personality trials? If you’re holding others to a standard you can’t meet, that’s not professionalism — it’s hypocrisy in a lanyard.
Things don’t make the person. And having none of them doesn’t make anyone less. Class doesn’t come with a pay grade; it comes from knowing how to behave when no one’s watching — especially when someone from a lower pay scale is doing the work you depend on.
Which brings me to this: if you’re in a position of influence — as a Gen X middle manager or a newly minted millennial boss — know that today’s teams aren’t moved by fear or flair. They respond to empathy, context, and — brace yourself — actual conversation. Authority doesn’t exempt you from emotional intelligence. The more you have, the less you’ll need to flex.
To lead this generation, you’ll need to unlearn a few things before you can claim to know anything at all. And you’ll need to remember that a sense of belongingness doesn’t grow in an environment that excludes. Belonging thrives only where inclusivity begins.
Still brewing thoughts — no sugarcoating, just stories steeped in truth.
