How to Manage Your Manager

The relationship between employee and boss is a touchy and at times complicated relationship to negotiate in the workplace. Like any relationship, it takes work, time, and effort by all parties involved in order to make it successful. While conventional wisdom may tell us that the manager should take the lead in fostering a better relationship with their employees, the reality is that leadership without authority is required in order to produce better relations among the manager and managed.

In order to fully understand what is going on in the mind of a manager we must put ourselves into their high priced dress shoes. We have to realize that they are under pressure for the performance of their team. The manager is the single point of responsibility for the team beneath them. So while they may come off like a ruthless thug, this is most likely a result of pressure put on them from above. However, in my experience, most managers want to be "cool". Meaning, they don't want to be a heartless, micro-managing, clock-watching, tyrant that blows up at the smallest of mistakes. This is a balancing act that goes on in the minds of managers that, honestly, takes a lot of education, experience, and talent to master.

I have seen one major point of consistency among managers that I have had through my career and can't quite explain why this is. But managers really don't like to define your role or explain exactly what it is that they expect out you. I'm not sure why this is, but I think it would take a thorough exploration into the psyche of managers to figure it out. I suspect that is has something to do with consistency. The manager wants you to work hard, and this will at times require work outside of your job description. But if there is no job description, perhaps, managers think that this is the best way to get the most out of employees. In my opinion, this is the worst, and this is where employees need to take the lead, and manage your manager.

Managers hate to confront an employee with performance issues, it's a very uncomfortable conversation and most people will avoid this confrontation like a cat avoids a room full of occupied rocking chairs. To help your manager out, you can strike up casual conversation about performance in an effort to better understand expectations. Ask them if this or that worked, or how we may be able to perform better on this in the future. Try to make it constructive and demonstrate an interest in improvement of the team. This takes a huge load off the mind of the manager because they don't have to think about how to confront these very difficult topics and chances are, you don't have a manager that is talented enough to do it well.

Another absolute necessity in cultivating a strong manager-employee relationship is the employee review. This is another one that is avoided like the swing flu section of the emergency room. The employee must again take the lead. My first suggestion is to get an employee review written into your offer letter upon hiring. If this doesn't happen, which is typically the case, you need to ask for one. Present it as a discussion of performance of the team and don't be afraid to give constructive suggestions of how you and your manager can work better and improve your relationship.

Should managers be better at bringing up expectations and performance issues? Yes, absolutely. But just as John Lennon said, we get by with a little help from our friends.

How to Manage Your Manager