Managing Up

Tascha is a manager in a small town near St. Louis. If you've read any other posts about her, you've read where she has had to deal with team issues and what she can do to help her team work in a positive environment.

Now, Tascha needs to use her skills to help develop the relationship with her boss. You see, Tascha thinks her boss, Jim, is kind of a manipulating jerk (not my words...hers) who is exhibits double standards, plays favorites, etc. (wow, he does sound like a prince, doesn't he?). She doesn't like Jim and feels like the relationship isn't very positive. Of course, Tascha also knows there's no law against being a jerk (Praise the Lord for that).

It doesn't seem that Jim's too concerned about their relationship, either. She's not sure if he doesn't care, doesn't have time, doesn't like her, doesn't really know how to build the relationship, or a combination of these. Still, Tascha knows it takes Two to Tango and has felt empowered from the success she's had with her team so she's going to give their relationship a try. She also knows that Jim isn't going anywhere; therefore, unless Tascha is willing to look for another job right now, she wants things to improve.

What should Tascha do to help "manage up" regarding her relationship with Jim? You know, it's not really that different from relationship-building with any other individual (just maybe a little more careful...at least at first):

1. Empathy: Sometimes it's easier to feel empathy with peers or team members than with the boss. After all, they get the big bucks and don't have any trouble letting "you know what" roll downhill. However, remember the adage, "it's lonely at the top". No truer words were ever spoken. Jim might really need someone who has some understanding for the stresses he's going through.
2. Understand the WIIFM: Tascha needs to know the boss' WIIFM (What's in it for me)? Of course, it's money and power, she thinks. Or is it? What's important to Jim personally and professionally?
3. Success: How does Jim measure success and how can Tascha help Jim be successful? Tascha is afraid of being used and abused by the boss...to which I reply, "you mean, like you use and abuse your folks?" Come on, every team member at every level of an organization has the responsibility to help the boss look good, just like every boss has the responsibility of taking care of the team.
4. Reach out: Yes, like I mentioned above, Jim is the boss so it's really his responsibility to build a relationship with Tascha. That's probably not going to happen. Therefore, Tascha needs to make the first move by giving Jim the benefit of the doubt.

If Tascha is willing to try the suggestions above, she may find out that Jim is the rat fink she always thought he was. On the other hand, once she makes an investment in the relationship, she may find that Jim, for all his faults, is OK on several levels.

What say you? Should Tascha just look for another job or should she try to help build and manage her relationship with Jim? What other suggestions might you have for Tascha?

NEXT POST: Tascha works on building a team with her fellow managers.

Perception and Reality

I had the pleasure of discussing the saying "perception is reality" with a friend of mine today. My friend and I didn't completely agree.

It can be considered trite and naive to believe that reality is up for grabs. As far as people, people management, people science, and all that are concerned, there are typically some, at least, socially acceptable truths. Someone's reality might be based on bigotry and this person might foster the belief that all short people are somehow inadequate, for example. There is no basis in conventional wisdom for that belief so one might say that this person's perception is not, in actuality, reality even though the person believes it. Norms of reality exist, huh?

So, we're comfortable with the idea that reality does exist. Great. The rub comes, however, when we get too wrapped up in what we call reality as opposed to what others call reality. We all have filters through which we look at life (see my post here on Reality Filters). These filters are often composed of our experiences both as children and as adults, as well as what we've been taught by people who have been influential in our lives. These filters are really powerful and can help us shape our personal reality. They can even help us slant the "conventional wisdom" realities to where they fit better into our beliefs. The bigot I mentioned above most certainly used filters to shape his "short hate".

OK...confusing...so, reality exists, but we have trouble pinning it down. Or, perhaps we have NO trouble pinning it down ourselves, but everyone around us just does a lot of head scratching, wondering what the heck we're thinking.

Perhaps the best thing we can hope to do is have faith. For me, that means faith in God. It also means that, except when I'm being really cynical, I have faith that people are basically decent, as a group. Other than that, we should look really hard at what our reality is and try to help it align (I didn't say agree) with those who are important in our lives.

The other thing we can to do is try to have empathetic spirits. We can to try to understand the reality of those around us. We don't have to agree with those realities, but we can to try to understand them so we can use what we've learned to better interact with others. We can be willing to accept (gulp...) that our ideas might be wrong or, at least, not necessarily the best ideas around. Since many of us have pretty strong beliefs, we should to try to temporarily "suspend" our assumptions (see my post on that here) and beliefs on a subject to help us better listen to other ideas and perceptions. Maybe the group will agree that I am right, that someone else is right, or that we both are (we can have multiple ideas, can't we?).

What about you? How do you handle the idea of reality and your views on it?