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At a big, big company, where I am but a peon, my goal is quite simple: make my boss look like a hero. When I do this, he is happy, because his boss looks like a hero. And he's happy, because his boss looks like a hero. I am not here for name recognition. I am here to put games in my consoles and food in my big belly.
When my boss gets mad (as he is prone to do - he flies off the handle quite easily, but I still like him quite a bit), I let it run its course. He'll say "you did this wrong!" and I'll go "okay, let me check on that and I'll get back to you." He's always not-as-mad later on, and that's when I can go back to him and say "See, I actually did this right, but I see why you thought I did it wrong." And he goes "Oh, okay." I used to try to point it out to him right then, and guess what? That's a battle I can't win. You never win by making your boss look like a dickhead.
One stupid thing I did, and other SAIC employees will understand this... my ops manager's name is Rob *****. I'll leave that last name blank. Anyway, my second day of working here, I'm a stupid 19 year old, and I get introduced to him - by my boss' boss. Rob ***** is my boss' boss' boss' boss. Anyway, as we're shaking hands, he goes "I'm Rob *****." And I say "I'm not." Not "I'm Dave Ham" or "Pleased to meet you, sir who could have my fired immediately." Yes, that actually happened, to my eternal shame. Don't do that.
One real good tip is to always get everything in writing. If your boss tells you to do something, email him and go "just wanted to confirm, I'm supposed to be doing _______." When he responds "yep!" then you're good to go. My boss is prone to assigning me fourteen different things, not telling me the priority, and then barking at me when I don't have ____ done by ___. I'll say "Dude, you told me to do ____ first" and he'll say "No no no no no." That's why you get it in writing - they can't refute that!
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