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COMMISSIONER of Customs Danville Walker is known to include a few choice words in the colourful language he uses to reprimand some of his workers. And he admits it.
WALKER. I don't tell people bad words as a management style
But not all the 1,035 employees at the Jamaica Customs Department can handle the off-colour adjectives and some have complained bitterly to the Observer about the manner in which the boss addresses them in the work environment.
Describing Walker's style as "confrontational and intimidating", they say it's something Walker was guilty of doing when he headed up the Electoral Office of Jamaica (EOJ) from which he migrated to the Customs 14 months ago.
"He will use indecent language to you and tell you things in meetings, like 'this is my meeting, if you don't like how I speak to you, you can leave'," one angry customs officer told the Observer.
Asked in an interview about the complaints, Walker, now 50, admits he is culpable at times of using language that's not exactly the Queen's English. But he believes that there may be justification for it.
"I can be a very irascible person sometimes. I know that. I think before my little tête-à-tête with Abe (Dabdoub) outside of the courthouse during a recent trial, people didn't realise that Danville knew a little foul language if necessary.
"If I am provoked, I will respond (but) it is my view that losing your temper is not a sign of strength; it is a sign of weakness," Walker also acknowledged.
"The men and women I have worked with in my time, who are considered towers of strength, are people whom I have never seen lose their temper. They are unflappable. I try my best to emulate those persons, but I can assure you that Customs gives you a lot of opportunities to test whether you are unflappable or not. Many of them I fail in," he says.
The commissioner says he is irritated by mediocrity and people not doing what they are supposed to do.
"What bothers me the most is when we miss an opportunity. when managers fail to manage. It's probably the thing that gets my goat more than anything else. When I find a manager who, instead of being proactive, suffers from ass-itis, which is just sitting on his ass; that tends to bother me."
Even so, Walker insists that he uses indecent language discreetly. "I don't tell people bad words as a management style. There are times when someone and myself would be having a private conversation and the language will be colourful and salty. But that is who I am. When I am issuing instructions to staff whether at staff meetings and management meetings, we are not using any language like that.
"I remember one day while I was at the EOJ, there was an officer who after crashing four vehicles before and being banned from driving, I pulled up at a stop light and realised that the vehicle in front of me was an EOJ vehicle with an 'L' on it and he was using our vehicle to teach someone to drive. I waited for an opportune time when he hit the vehicle again, claiming that he had an emergency, and he saw a different side of Danville that time.
"Outside of those things, even from when I was a soldier, I know how to punish people and how to do so creatively.
"Very soon after I arrive at an organisation, I can tell you what people love. If it's at Customs, I can tell you it is overtime and travelling. When I was in the army, what soldiers loved was being on the road. They loved time. I will take away your privileges.
"So if overtime is your thing, I am going to put you where you earn no overtime. If you are in the army, you would do duty that you would think that you are the only soldier that the JDF (Jamaica Defence Force) has," Walker adds.
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/...ANGUAGE__.asp#
WALKER. I don't tell people bad words as a management style
But not all the 1,035 employees at the Jamaica Customs Department can handle the off-colour adjectives and some have complained bitterly to the Observer about the manner in which the boss addresses them in the work environment.
Describing Walker's style as "confrontational and intimidating", they say it's something Walker was guilty of doing when he headed up the Electoral Office of Jamaica (EOJ) from which he migrated to the Customs 14 months ago.
"He will use indecent language to you and tell you things in meetings, like 'this is my meeting, if you don't like how I speak to you, you can leave'," one angry customs officer told the Observer.
Asked in an interview about the complaints, Walker, now 50, admits he is culpable at times of using language that's not exactly the Queen's English. But he believes that there may be justification for it.
"I can be a very irascible person sometimes. I know that. I think before my little tête-à-tête with Abe (Dabdoub) outside of the courthouse during a recent trial, people didn't realise that Danville knew a little foul language if necessary.
"If I am provoked, I will respond (but) it is my view that losing your temper is not a sign of strength; it is a sign of weakness," Walker also acknowledged.
"The men and women I have worked with in my time, who are considered towers of strength, are people whom I have never seen lose their temper. They are unflappable. I try my best to emulate those persons, but I can assure you that Customs gives you a lot of opportunities to test whether you are unflappable or not. Many of them I fail in," he says.
The commissioner says he is irritated by mediocrity and people not doing what they are supposed to do.
"What bothers me the most is when we miss an opportunity. when managers fail to manage. It's probably the thing that gets my goat more than anything else. When I find a manager who, instead of being proactive, suffers from ass-itis, which is just sitting on his ass; that tends to bother me."
Even so, Walker insists that he uses indecent language discreetly. "I don't tell people bad words as a management style. There are times when someone and myself would be having a private conversation and the language will be colourful and salty. But that is who I am. When I am issuing instructions to staff whether at staff meetings and management meetings, we are not using any language like that.
"I remember one day while I was at the EOJ, there was an officer who after crashing four vehicles before and being banned from driving, I pulled up at a stop light and realised that the vehicle in front of me was an EOJ vehicle with an 'L' on it and he was using our vehicle to teach someone to drive. I waited for an opportune time when he hit the vehicle again, claiming that he had an emergency, and he saw a different side of Danville that time.
"Outside of those things, even from when I was a soldier, I know how to punish people and how to do so creatively.
"Very soon after I arrive at an organisation, I can tell you what people love. If it's at Customs, I can tell you it is overtime and travelling. When I was in the army, what soldiers loved was being on the road. They loved time. I will take away your privileges.
"So if overtime is your thing, I am going to put you where you earn no overtime. If you are in the army, you would do duty that you would think that you are the only soldier that the JDF (Jamaica Defence Force) has," Walker adds.
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/...ANGUAGE__.asp#
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