This is the second in a 3 part series of posts based on an interview with Phil Gerbyshak. Come back tomorrow for the next post in the series or subscribe to the blog. Read other posts from the interview»

A lot of the things that I write about and that I talk about are things that I learn from my team or things that I’ve learned from other managers.

For instance, my team taught me not to talk about poop at 6:30 in the morning.

One of the things I’ve tried to do with my team was to read to them at team meetings. Once a week, for about two months, I would read to them. The last straw came when I read a passage from a book called “The Dog Poop Initiative,” by Kirk Weisler. It sounds a little odd, but it’s actually a book all about the power of taking initiative and doing the right thing. After I read that passage to them, their eyes glazed over and someone said, “I can’t believe you’re reading me a book about poop at 6:30 in the morning.”

I learned a valuable lesson that morning – and ended up turning it into a little phrase: “Don’t talk about poop at 6:30 in the morning.” It basically boils down to this: As a manager, you need to try new things because you never know what’s going to work. But you need to be receptive to them and willing to move on when things don’t work. Through this process comes a deeper understanding – both for you and your team – of who they are and what makes them tick.

My company knows what I do and that my eventual plan is to break out of corporate America.

Everybody says they are committed to learning, but it’s really hard to judge in an interview how committed someone is.

When I ask interviewees the most recent book they read, being an IT Manager, it’s pretty consistent that they’re immersed in Microsoft books or Cisco books. I’m realizing now, though, that the folks that are curious about something outside of IT are really going to be more successful than the folks that are only interested in IT.

I recently wrote a post where I said something like, “I’ve only quit my managers, not my companies.” That’s actually something I’ve been thinking about for a few years now. I realized that the people that I work for really have to be top quality people, and if they are not good people, if they don’t have my best interest in heart, well then I don’t want to be there.

I’m really fortunate right now that I have two bosses that really care about me. It makes my life a lot easier, a lot richer. It makes the decisions that I make probably more congruent with what the company wants me to be.

I joke with my boss that I often use “WWBD” as my management style. It’s, literally, “What would Brian do?” Brian is my CTO—my direct manager is Cindy. I really enjoy working for both of them. I trust them. I know they’re smart people and that they trust me. So, when I need to make a decision, I often think, “What would they do?” If they would make a decision, then I probably should make that decision, too. And if they wouldn’t, then I probably should not.

My management style is somewhat hands-on. I actually use something Tom Pitters talked about as management by walking around; Rosa Say talked calls it her daily five minutes.

Basically, I try my best to get around and talk to each of my associates. “Hey, how was your weekend? How is your spouse? How is your kid?” One of my employees had a pet rabbit that was really sick a couple of weeks back. And to her that was the most important thing in the world. Now, I’m not going to lie and say that I care about her rabbit, but I care about her. I care about how she is doing. I care about the impact this event has on her life. So, I don’t say “Hey, you know I really hope your rabbit is doing great” because I really love rabbits. I say it because I care about her and what’s important to her.

It’s really about personalizing the attention to each person. I even have some folks that could give a care if I ever stopped by. So, if that’s how it works, so be it. That’s OK. That’s up to them. I personalize it to them.

Phil Gerbyshak has scaled the corporate mountains and is now chasing his dreams. Five words sum him up nicely: “Energetic, helpful, inspiring, enthusiastic, fun”. He blogs at Make it Great and The Slacker Manager at Bizzia. Follow him on Twitter.

Published Tuesday, August, 11, 2009