Getting Along With Your Manager, Part Two
Bruce Tulgan is well known for helping managers understand younger workers. Now in a new book called It’s Okay to Manage the Boss he says, there is an “under management epidemic” and the responsibility for getting along with a manager is up to the employee.
Manager’s don’t manage, says Tulgan, but an employee needs clear expectations for performance that can be framed into concrete actions. If you don’t know what’s expected of you between now and your next review (an institution whose value is debatable according to Samuel A. Culbert at UCLA) it’s time to ask.
The days of hitching your wagon to some else’s rising star may be over, Tulgan says, and catering to a boss’ whims, style and preferences at the expense of your own career development is a recipe for career mismanagement. Instead he suggests an employee have clear expectations of what the job entails and make requests for candid feedback. It’s also an employee’s job to figure out how frequently feedback is useful and whether you can arrange for it in small manageable bites or in longer, less frequent meetings.
He says after establishing ground rules, including an estimate of how long the relationship might last, keep score for yourself. He advocates writing your own operating procedures, planning your own schedule and prioritizing your daily and weekly tasks, all the while being sure to run your intentions by your manage. And yes, a manager may even be threatened by your industriousness.
The reality, says Tulgan, is everyone you come in contact with on a daily basis is a boss, whether it’s a manager in another section or one of your customers. Just accept the fact as a given.
Above all, your manager needs to be kept in the loop. And never go behind his or her back or over his or her head. If a manager takes issue with any of the strategies, Tulgan recommends a sincere simple and a dose of humility. “Smile and say golly,” he says, and never surprise the boss.
While what he proposes is fairly labor intensive, the practice may stand an employee in good stead when he or she becomes a manager.
