Patricia Bays Haroski registered "National Boss' Day" with the
U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 1958. She was working as a secretary for
State Farm Insurance Company in
Deerfield, Illinois for her father at the time and chose October 16, which was her father's birthday. The purpose was to show the appreciation for her bosses she thought they deserved. This was also a strategy to attempt to improve intra-office relationships between managers and their employees. Haroski believed young employees sometimes did not understand the hard work and dedication that their supervisors put into their work and the challenges they faced. Four years later, in 1962, Illinois Governor
Otto Kerner backed Haroski's registration and officially proclaimed the day.
Hallmark Cards did not offer a Boss' Day card for sale until 1979. It increased the size of its National Boss' Day line by 28 percent in 2007. ==Criticism==