You're in a supermarket doing some shopping. As you're picking out a nice ripe cantaloupe, you spot a sign on an empty display case that states, "Wet paint. Do not touch!" What's the next thing you do? Like me, you're going to touch it. Right? So, you touch it. After getting paint on your fingers, the painter approaches and angrily says, "You just had to touch it, didn't you? Why did you have to tamper with my nice work? I'm a professional at what I do, and now you messed it up. Please mind your own business! I'm not trying to pick out your cantaloupe, am I?"

Yikes! He sure told you off, didn't he? You shouldn't have interfered with his nice paint job. Who made you a paint expert anyway?

Speaking of interfering, do you ever have experiences with people who want to get involved in your line of responsibility? I'm sure you do. It's as though they know more than you do about your job. Why is it that no matter which job position a person holds, he or she always seem to know something about produce? They manage to pop up in every meeting room and have some small, meaningless contributions to offer whenever a produce subject is put on the table. Their contributions are usually nonsensical. It is very dangerous to take their advice seriously.

There are countless numbers of tales heard in the trenches about bosses and other people "butting in" on the operations of produce experts. You've been there and know these people. They're reckless backseat drivers. They usually look over your shoulder muttering, "You should do it this way. You should do it that way. You shouldn't do it at all."

Many produce executives often find themselves in an awkward position whenever a company owner, chairperson, president or other superior makes a suggestion from their world of daffyland. Finally, the produce executive caves in and follows along with the idea, only to find that it turns out to be a complete disaster. Afterwards, the senior management people who made the suggestion are nowhere to be found.

I once had a superior who came from another company and stuck his nose in every staff member's operation. He went about wanting department heads to make some preposterous changes that actually lowered sales and destroyed the gross margin.

He insisted that we should place all peppers on display with the stems facing outward. We did it for two months and the displays looked absolutely dreadful. In addition, the sales results took a substantial nosedive.

Challenged with this pepper merchandising fiasco, I ran (not walked) to my boss' office and faced up to him with the poor statistics. My recommendation was to revert to our former display method. Hard-nosed as he was, he agreed. We changed back, and sales improved very rapidly.

The most typical complaint by employees is that bosses invariably interfere with their work by dreaming up ideas that are just plain useless. This develops a feeling by individuals that their superiors lack confidence in them.

I talked about this subject with several industry friends who agreed to comment under the condition of anonymity.

--- The over-the-shoulder boss: "My boss knows absolutely nothing about buying produce or the different shipping labels. He's always looking over a buyer's shoulder giving a directive of what he likes and wants in the stores. Our produce-buying operation is now in complete turmoil because of him. As the head buyer, I can't even make the decisions anymore."

--- The cut-it-out boss: "Because of severe weather, the entire lettuce market shot way out of sight. Get this. Our operating vice president wanted us to discontinue Iceberg lettuce altogether. I told him that doing this would be like discontinuing ground meat or sliced bread. Can you imagine discontinuing Iceberg lettuce?"

--- The destructive boss: "We had a marketing vice president once who rarely went out to the stores. But when he did, he would destroy our produce sales. His suggestions were dangerous. He conned our president into forcing us to display strawberries in bulk. The entire change was an instant catastrophe. We threw out strawberries left and right due to rough customer handling. The floors turned bright red, sticky and filthy. We even had some lawsuits from slippage accidents. After several more of his wild merchandising directives throughout the stores, the company finally fired him. It took months to recover the sales he managed to destroy."

---The flamethrower boss. "Every time my boss comes out from behind his desk, it's as though he carries a flame thrower with him. He shoots down all our new ideas before we even get a chance to get them started. One day while we were reviewing a proof in an advertising meeting, he rudely entered the meeting room and started criticizing the fact that we had seedless watermelons in the ad. He claimed people want seeded watermelons because the kids like to spit out the seeds. His reasoning was an absolute joke."

These frustrating stories are just a few from the reality of the trenches. Each of you has one tucked away that could easily be added to the list. Personally, I have hundreds of them.

Overbearing superiors should stop treating talented employees like two-year-old children. People responsible for other departments should also butt out. Once and for all, just let the produce experts run the produce.