Manage your boss essay

Manage your boss essay

Executive Summary (1 page)

summarize the advice such that someone who has not listened to the podcast will be able to glean the main points. Please include the steps along with a brief explanation of each step. This section should be single-spaced. Present the summary in a format that will be easy for others that to read.

Up to 5 ref if needed but not necessary. Manage your boss essay.

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Analysis of the Advice (2-3 pages)

think like an Industrial Psychologist, reflect on the advice, and offer your opinion on the validity of the advice they give in the podcast. Are their suggestions practical? Will they work in your organization? If you do not have a job, think about a student or volunteer organization you’re in. What advice can you immediately implement? How should you change your behavior to be in line with their suggestions? You do not have to answer all of these questions – these are merely suggestions for what to write about. Do not summarize their advice in this section. This section is to analyze the advice they gave. This section should be double-spaced. 5 ref. if needed but not necessarily. Manage your boss essay.

Managing Your Boss

We had intended to cover Managing Upwards back in December, during our sessions on

writing reviews. As it turned out, while we barely scratched the surface on how to do

reviews, it nevertheless took us FOUR casts. We didn’t want to delay those casts,

obviously, in light of their time sensitivity. So, we delayed this topic until now.

Managing Upwards for the most part boils down to Creating a Good Relationship with Your

Boss. There is a lot to be said about politics in organizations, and whom you should know

and whom you should stay in touch with. We’ve found that those topics don’t lend

themselves easily to a simple cast if we want to give you actionable guidance. That IS what

we’re about, after all. Manage your boss essay.

So, we’re going to focus on some things you can do that will help you improve your

relationship with your boss.

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Outline

1. A True Story

2. The Basics.

a. Boss Goals

b. Boss Communications

c. Boss Schedule/Time Management

d. Boss Work style

e. Boss Relationships

Shownotes

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1. A True Story .

Mark recently worked with an Executive Vice President of a multi billion dollar service

company who had lost her job. To give you an idea of how different life is for senior

executives, for those of you who are not in that rarefied air yet, she wasn’t going to the

office, and technically hadn’t been fired…but it had been made clear she was no longer

employed. She stayed home for 2 and a half months, until the performance compensation

she was mostly entitled to were paid. She was paid salary while she was not working.

This executive had been with her firm for 21 years. She had worked largely in the back

office, and had created a record that was so stellar even Mark was impressed. Not only

had she hit home run after home run, in TOUGH situations, but she was one of the most

loved people in a large company he’s ever known. Everyone who ever worked for her loved

her. She was pretty clearly special. Big barbecues at her and her husband’s house were so

well known that they stopped inviting people and just told people to come on along (and

got it catered). Truly, a wonderfully successful, effective executive.

She was asked to take a special assignment not long ago, to “go fix” the financial systems

of the company. She was asked by the CEO, and even though she would report to the CFO,

it was pretty clear he had a mandate from the top.

In 30 days, she was fired…and hundreds if not thousands of managers in the company

were DEVASTATED. What happened? Manage your boss essay.

What happened was that she had thought that because the CEO sent her over, she could

actually make things happen and fix things. But she didn’t know/understand/appreciate

the CFO’s position. When she suggested to the CFO that a big re-org needed to be done,

the politically minded and nervous CFO walked into the CEOs office and described her as

power hungry and backstabbing, and then put together some half truths the CEO bought

into.

This manager did the RIGHT THING.. and was fired because she didn’t understand her

boss. Didn’t know what he wanted, how we wanted it, when he wanted it, or who else he

needed to please. Manage your boss essay.

Don’t let this happen to you.

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2. The Basics.

There are FIVE areas that we recommend you focus on in your relationship with your boss.

(By the way, it’s possible you’ll hear some of these topics repeated when we cover what to

do in the first 90 days on the job. however, we’ve discovered that managers tend to

dismiss things that they think don’t apply to them, so we’ve excluded those parts of this

topic that are only about starting out. These recommendations ALWAYS work, and are

worth revisiting annually.)

We list these topics in their order of importance to you, and the order in which you ought

to go about thinking about them. It’s not a rote one at a time process, of course. You’re

going to learn about all the topics at various times. This just suggests where your focus

should be, and what will help you the soonest. Manage your boss essay.

And remember, you’re unlikely to change your boss… so be ready to change yourself.

a. Boss Goals

This is the SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT thing you should know about your boss. And, its

likely you don’t know what these things are, except for those issues that relate to you

and your team. If you learn what your boss’s goals are, and which are most important to

him, you will be more effective at getting what you want from him. he will also perceive

you as sensitive to his needs and politically savvy.

This starts with asking, what are you responsible to YOUR boss for? What are your

revenue, cost, and profitability requirements? What metrics do they use to measure

you and by extension, me and my team supporting you? Which of those is most

important to you? What does your boss ask that is above and beyond or different than

what the org wants? What are your budget responsibilities? What do you have to create

your budget, and how long does it take? May I look at your budget to get me ready for

the next cycle (if you need to scrub it before I can see it, that’s fine.) What reporting are

you required to do on your budget, and when do you have to do it?

Continuing, you’ll note that above we focused on financials. Well, DUH. The quickest

way to trouble in most places is ignoring financials. An easy way to think about

responsibilities is to break them down into financials, operations, and people.

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Remember, we’re looking for Goals and RESPONSIBIILITIES in these areas.

Once you’ve asked the financial questions, the people and operational questions are

much easier, and are much more company/industry dependent. On the other hand,

we’ve found that bosses tend to be much more forthcoming on other goals they have

once you ask, for the most part. And often, they just spill everything they’ve got as soon

as you ask.

The second part of this line of inquiry is “What’s my role in helping you achieve that?”

For each of the above questions, you can ask what your boss sees your role as being.

Now, you might be thinking, what do I DO? Just walk in and start asking away? Well, no,

not exactly. But, regardless of what time of year it is, or how long you’ve worked for

your boss, THESE FIRST QUESTIONS AROUND GOALS JUSTIFY A SEPARATE MEETINGS

WITH YOUR BOSS TO LEARN THE ANSWERS. So, schedule a meeting with him/her, email

the questions in advance, and ask for as much detail as you can.

If you’ve worked for a boss for a while, we’ve found the best way to address the fact

that you know some of this is to send both the questions and those answers which you

know in advance. Having them written out will allow her to add/change/delete/leave

alone/save time.

If you’re wondering how to preface these questions, because you’re afraid you’re going

to be thought weird/stupid/incompetent… this is the way Mark recommends to clients:

“I’m doing an annual reassessment of my roles and goals, and want to include your

guidance…” Another that I’ve seen work is, “My professional development effort this

year is around being EFFECTIVE, and that means focusing on what’s most important…”

Okay, so you’re going to set up a meeting, email the questions in advance (with answers

you think you already know), and then take great notes in the meeting. If you think

you’re going to run over, bail out and ask for more time later. (This is because we’re

cleverly assuming you don’t know what his approach to time management is yet, not

having asked. ;-))) )

We consider this important enough that if you don’t konw all of her goals now, you

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must within THRITY DAYS.

b. Boss Communications

This area seems pretty simple, and yet it is the one most often missed. We put it second

because you usually can’t ask directly, but it has BIG implications for every other area.

The sooner you start paying attention to your boss’s comm style, the sooner you’ll be

able to adapt. Manage your boss essay.

Peter Drucker has a clever way of thinking about this. In all his years of working with

managers, he discovered that they tend to learn (take in new information) with a

preference towards one of two ways: Listeners, and Readers. His simple technique for

using that bit of boss knowledge is summed up as, “if she’s a listener, brief her verbally

first, then follow up with a report. If he’s a reader, send a memo first, then follow up

with a briefing.” Manage your boss essay.

Wow simple!!!

To go a bit further. here are some questions to look for clues to.

Does he prefer voicemail or email? Do you get individual emails from him about work

that he could have just asked you about? Do you get long voicemails at night or on the

weekends? What does he choose to share in person? Is his comm channel choice

always a function of topic? Projects by email, announcements by vmail, operations in

meetings? It happens, and it’s confusing unless you know to think about it.

How does she run meetings? Tight agendas means more advance work for you. What

kind of sharing does she do from meetings she goes to? If not a lot, you’ll need to be

asking about them and their fallout.

When it comes to face to face: what are his verbal, Vocal and visual clues? Verbally, for

instance, does he tend to ask questions, or make statements? Take a seat, or would you

like to sit down? Does he tend to talk first, or a lot, or listen first, or more than talking?

Does he reserve opinions, or come right out with them?

Vocally, is her delivery steady and even? or noticeably varied? is it forceful or not (can

you see them giving a speech?) Is it lower than average volume, or up there? Is it faster

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than you, or slower? (Forget about where they’re from.)

Visually, what kind of handshake – gentle or firm? Regular eye contact or intermittent?

Small gestures or big? What kind of colors in their clothes? Lots of facial expressions, or

few? Does he make contact with you or not?

It’s not necessary for you to MIMIC your boss – it will irritate her and make you look

foolish. But knowing where you’re different and moderating your differences will make

you ENORMOUSLY more effective. ENORMOUSLY. Besides smiling and being willing to

subordinate oneself to others, Mark believes that this awareness and moderation are

the most powerful interpersonal tools he uses every day.

c. Boss Schedule/Time Management

This is one that you really don’t HAVE to ask about… you’ll learn it pretty quickly if you

remind yourself to pay attention. That said, if you’re having a great meeting early on,

and want to ask about scheduling, go for it!

This is as simple as knowing what your boss’s schedule is. I bet you’ve been thinking you

know what it is. But if she doesn’t publish it, answer this: how many standing meetings

does she go to that you don’t, when are they, how often are they changed, and what

are the topics? Manage your boss essay.

See, you don’t.

Some things you should know: What, when, where and with whom are his standing

meetings? WHEN DOES HE MEET WITH HIS BOSS AS PART OF STAFF OR IN A ONE ON

ONE? And would you leave him alone during the hour before it? And would you expect

some things to change within 6 hours after it?

When is he busiest? Morning or late afternoon? When is he NOT busy but wants to be

left alone? How tightly does he run his time? Ho much at risk will you be if you handle

time differently than he does? What nights does he go home on time, and when does

he stay late? How often does he send night and weekend emails? How in general does

he feel about the start and end of the workday?

The way you get to these is, as we said above, not necessarily by interviewing the boss.

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We recommend asking your peers for insight. Ask his assistant for a printed copy of his

weekly schedule. Review YOUR calendar for meetings he’s called.

d. Boss Work style

This is one of the harder things to discern quickly if you are new. Specifically, what we’re

asking you to ask here is, “What level of involvement does he want to have, on what

topics?” This boils down to what he delegates, and how involved he stays. The issue for

you is how much you’ll have to tolerate of his interaction after you own a task (if he

thinks you EVERY own it), and what amount of reporting will help her stay out of things,

or at least give you SOME room. Manage your boss essay.

e. Boss Relationships

This is one that we don’t recommend you tackle right away. If you get the other four

areas down pat, this one will probably happen naturally. You can discern this with the

answer to one simple question, but it may take some knowledge of your company we

can’t teach you how to get.

With whom, outside of her chain of command, does this manager regularly meet? (This

could be lunch, dinner, breakfast, hanging out in each others’ offices, etc. COULD be

work related, may not be).

We’d like you to tell US why this is important to you. first one with the right answer gets

a free copy of The Effective Executive, Getting Things Done, or The World is Flat, your

choice, mailed to you.

Special Tips:

There are three other things we recommend you do in terms of managing your

relationship with your boss. (Have you picked up on the fact that we don’t say

“managing your boss”? We think that’s kinda funny… at least we would if we were your

boss.)

Weekly One on Ones with your boss. If you have to couch it as an update meeting, fine.

Ask for a half hour, and only take YOUR FIFTEEN MINUTES. If he wants to go longer, let

him take over…and you’re having something approximating a O3. Don’t do this until you

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start with YOUR team, though… If he cuts you off when you’re done, and YOU WILL BE

DONE in 15 minutes if you’re smart… fine. You’re getting the best you can get.

Quarterly performance review. Ask your boss for an hour to get feedback over the

previous 3 months. If he wont’ give it to you, fine… fill out a review form and get it to

him. If he wonders why, tell him, “to make it easier for both of us to keep track of stuff

3-6-9 months from now.” You will forget just like she will. (You can do this along with

updating your resume… it’s like we know what we’re talking about!) Manage your boss essay.

Share all this about YOU with YOUR TEAM. Don’t make them ask… walk them through

all five areas. Do a Jerry Maguire… help them help you!!!

Wrap Up

1. A True Story

2. The Basics.

a. Boss Goals

b. Boss Communications

c. Boss Schedule/Time Management

d. Boss Work style

e. Boss Relationships

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Manage your boss essay