This otherwise-excellent IT manager has one big problem: He has a habit of tearing his employees’ work apart in the middle of the office, says a pilot fish on the scene.

“One day he drew up a plan that was seriously flawed, and I decided to give him a taste of his own medicine,” says fish. “He gave me a copy of the plan. I read it, ripped it in half, threw it in the wastebasket and called it junk.

“He rose to the bait and said, ‘You can't just say that.’ Rolling up my sleeves I started to destroy the entire plan point by point, highlighting all the flaws and asking which idiot had written this in the first place — in front of the entire office.

“Let's just say motivation and morale in the team increased.

“He got his own back, though. He set up a meeting for the next day, and guess who was nominated to draw up the new plan?”

Sharky loves a happy ending. Or any ending, really, so long as it’s attached to a true tale of IT life. Send me yours at sharky@computerworld.com. You can also subscribe to the Daily Shark Newsletter.