When bosses walk in employees’ shoes
It is hard for managers to understand what life is like for staff. But not impossible
![](https://www.economist.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1424,quality=80,format=auto/media-assets/image/20221022_WBD002.jpg)
Any manager worth their salt knows the value of spending time “walking in their customers’ shoes”. There are many ways to do it. You can observe customers in their natural habitat. Pernod Ricard’s boss recently told Bloomberg, a news service, about his habit of bar-hopping in order to see what people want to drink. Such research is a lot less fun if your company makes soap dispensers for public toilets but the same principle applies.
This article appeared in the Business section of the print edition under the headline “Walking in employees’ shoes”
Business October 22nd 2022
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