As mentioned over time, our job is to deliver energy to our teams, our agencies, our brands and finally our clients or consumers. This energy should not be spent on complaining or conflicting with our boss, but should on the contrary be enhanced through a healthy collaboration. We might all have the tendency to expect from others a certain behaviour that will make our life happier, our brand more successful, our wallet richer or our day at work better. A sort of human lottery in which success would only be depending on others. There are interesting ways to take the control back on most of those elements, especially on our day at work. If managing our team or our agencies seems a logical act, managing our boss sounds unnatural. It is however key to ensure a cross fertilisation within the company and take the control back on perception and interaction, helping us through a new ownership to become the CEO of our own position.
10 Rules to manage your boss and enjoy ownership that delivers results and wellbeing
1. See your boss as a golden key capable of opening doors you cannot – He or she is a resource to help making things happen
2. Communicate Good news: No one knows what you have been doing great, unless you make it visible. Nobody sees the baker at 3am…
3. Communicate bad news in time: do not let your boss discover bad news on his or her own, especially when it’s too late
4. Provide solutions, not problems. This installs trust and respect – If there are no solution seen…remember that questioning is about exposing options and not about complaining
5. Come prepared, do not improvise: he or she is a boss not a friend
6. Make it short: quantity only makes his or her life harder as well as yours – shorten your mails and favour human contact – few chosen words even when face to face allow stronger control
7. Talk about what motivates you, do not let him or her guess for you, while asking about what is expected from you
8. Make your boss look good, like anybody else in your team actually
9. EMPATHY – Realise your boss is human and has as much emotions and constraints than you – ask about his or her own objectives and performance measurement
10. 80% Agreement – 100% commitment: question if necessary but apply in the end: hierarchy is there for a reason
Now that we have taken internal control back, how can we “manage” our consumers or our clients?
