How to Deal with a Micromanaging Boss
Bosses are tough to deal with in general. They represent authority, and they often bring back memories of what we hated most in our relationships with our parents and teachers growing up. The micro-managing boss is especially hard to handle if you are creative, innovative, and want to make a contribution of your own in an organization. But since quite a few people in management positions fit this profile, chances are you will end up with one at some point in your career. Here are some tips to help you get the space you need to thrive:
1. Understand that micromanaging behavior is driven by the positive characteristics of conscientiousness, diligence, and responsibility; it’s just that they have been taken to an extreme. People often confuse themselves with the quality of the work they produce. As long as they can control the quality of their work, they are ok, but as soon as they have to depend on others for results, they are faced with the fear of representing sloppy or substandard output. Since putting out less than excellent work is SO personally humiliating, they need constant reassurance that the team is performing. Keep in mind that behavior such as constant checking on your progress or reviewing your work has NOTHING to do with how well you perform. It is about your boss, who has gotten so caught up in his or her fears and needs for reassurance that he or she is not aware of how this behavior may be impacting you.
2. You can give yourself space by playing to their standards for excellence and needs for reassurance. Initiate a conversation about expectations and standards of work output, and make sure your boss is clear about where your standards are. If you have a difference of opinion, get it talked out and come to an agreement about what standards you are both comfortable with. Then COMMUNICATE. It’s natural to react to micro-management by doing everything possible to avoid communication. But that just plays into the vicious circle of mutual mistrust and escalates the problem. If you develop a habit of sending a short e-mail on a daily or weekly basis that gives your status on a project and how you are handling situations, the boss gets a stream of continuous reassurance, and wont feel a strong need to check in.
3. Once you have developed a certain degree of trust with your boss, you may want to take it to the next step, and that is providing feedback on the impact of the micromanaging behavior. For example, “I notice that you have redone my last three powerpoint presentations. I understand your desire to have us represented in a positive light, but you may not realize that you are sending a subtle message, that I can’t do powerpoint presentations, and that makes me feel less excited about doing them well in the first place. Is there something specific you are noticing about the way I do my presentations that does not meet the standards we agreed on related to our work?”
Unfortunately, the micro-managing boss ends up fulfilling his own fears. As he takes more responsibility for the work of the team, the team feels completely disempowered and loses the motivation to produce their best work. Soon they are complaining and doing very little, and he is fretting about how they don’t care and he has the weight of more than one job on his shoulders. It may take several attempts to help him turn around, because he needs to let go and allow himself to look bad in order to re-empower the team, build trust, and get to the point where he gets results that are better than he ever dreamed.
If you are a micro-manager, or you work for one, anything you can do to facilitate the change will be a positive learning experience. Giving your boss feedback that enables him to become a better leader is a gift he will be forever grateful for. And if you are that boss, imagine getting rid of the experience of being overworked and not being able to trust anyone, and moving to a place where you get to work with people who consistently go well beyond the call of duty, and you are so honored to be their leader that you would never consider taking ownership for the phenomenal work they put forth.
Showing posts with label letting go. Show all posts
Showing posts with label letting go. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Sunday, February 18, 2007
When ONE relationship drives you nuts! How to get over it.
Every once in awhile, you will run into someone who gets under your skin. Maybe you are too intrigued for comfort, or consistently angry about how they treat you. If you find yourself focusing on a particular person and emotionally reacting to him or her more than you would like, it’s time to look inside yourself, and see what unmet need the person is triggering.
We all have needs, and we are driven to get them met. Unfortunately, we tend to “push down” many of our needs, because they make us feel vulnerable. Sometimes we are embarrassed of having them, and often we don’t feel like we have control over getting them met. But conscious or not, we will continue to work to get our needs met, and when the subconscious parts of our brain take over, the result is usually less-effective behavior, the kind you exhibit when you are panicking or reacting to something.
In many cases, especially with relationship needs, we begin to focus on one person and decide that they are the only person who can meet our needs. Unfortunately, this practice creates scarcity, and almost guarantees that the need will remain unmet. Even if the "focused on" person tries, they can never give enough. This sets into motion a dynamic where the person with the need is often angry and resentful, and the other person feels drained by the relationship and pulls away. This happens a lot in love relationships, but also in friendships, and in the workplace. At work it’s especially common in boss / employee relationships where the employee is focusing on the boss.
It is important to understand that all needs reside within you, and it is your responsibility to get them met – even relationship needs. This is why we have the saying “you must love yourself before you can truly love another”. If you don’t love yourself, then your relationship with someone else is only about getting love from them, which comes across as manipulating them so that you feel loved by them, instead of truly loving them by allowing them to be themselves.
Relationship needs are satisfied in the energy that is created through connection with others. But you aren’t limited to or dependent on how others treat you. You have a relationship with yourself, and you may have a spiritual relationship with a higher being. If there were no other people on the planet, you would instinctively be driven to create special relationships with animals and plants. Potential for relationship is everywhere, and it’s bi-directional. You don’t just get it – you co-create it. That’s why giving so often feels like receiving, and people are often driven to give what they most need from others. It’s a strategy that sometimes works, and works even better if you are aware of your true motive for giving.
To “let go” of the person you are focusing on, you need to do two things:
1. Identify the need you are trying to get met from that particular person.
2. Get that need met outside the relationship, in as many other ways as possible.
Initially, it will seem like there’s no other place to get the need met, or that the other places don’t matter, but this what I call “panic mode”, where your brain stops the creative thinking process and has fallen into the adrenaline driven action process. To create abundance from scarcity, you get your brain working on how to get the need met outside of the relationship you are focusing on, and the way to do that is ask yourself questions. Here are some you can start with:
1. What is the specific feeling I get when this need is met?
2. What are all the situations where I get a similar feeling?
3. How can I co-create something similar (although perhaps not as good) in my other relationships?
4. What can I do in my relationship with myself to get this need met?
Even though some people aren’t as interesting as other people, there are usually enough of the base components available in everyone you meet, so that you can co-create a little bit of what you need in various different people, which is usually the healthiest and most empowering way to get your core relationship needs met.
At a deeper level, you may have to listen hard to the negative voices in your head. Usually, the biggest culprit in unmet relationship needs is that “voice” that hangs out in your head and talks to you all day. If it’s critical and unloving, it tends to suck more out of you than anyone outside of you. Sometimes the best way to get a relationship need met is to be a better friend to yourself.
The basic needs model is simple – but the process is always easier said than done. If you find that the concept I’m writing about makes sense, but you can’t seem to move yourself out of the emotional trap, it might be useful to get some coaching.
I now have an on-line needs assessment available that takes about 20 – 40 minutes to fill out. If you’d like to take a needs assessment, send an e-mail to nahid@aspyrre.com requesting one, and I’d be happy to get you set up.
Copyright © 2007, Nahid Casazza and Aspyrre.
Every once in awhile, you will run into someone who gets under your skin. Maybe you are too intrigued for comfort, or consistently angry about how they treat you. If you find yourself focusing on a particular person and emotionally reacting to him or her more than you would like, it’s time to look inside yourself, and see what unmet need the person is triggering.
We all have needs, and we are driven to get them met. Unfortunately, we tend to “push down” many of our needs, because they make us feel vulnerable. Sometimes we are embarrassed of having them, and often we don’t feel like we have control over getting them met. But conscious or not, we will continue to work to get our needs met, and when the subconscious parts of our brain take over, the result is usually less-effective behavior, the kind you exhibit when you are panicking or reacting to something.
In many cases, especially with relationship needs, we begin to focus on one person and decide that they are the only person who can meet our needs. Unfortunately, this practice creates scarcity, and almost guarantees that the need will remain unmet. Even if the "focused on" person tries, they can never give enough. This sets into motion a dynamic where the person with the need is often angry and resentful, and the other person feels drained by the relationship and pulls away. This happens a lot in love relationships, but also in friendships, and in the workplace. At work it’s especially common in boss / employee relationships where the employee is focusing on the boss.
It is important to understand that all needs reside within you, and it is your responsibility to get them met – even relationship needs. This is why we have the saying “you must love yourself before you can truly love another”. If you don’t love yourself, then your relationship with someone else is only about getting love from them, which comes across as manipulating them so that you feel loved by them, instead of truly loving them by allowing them to be themselves.
Relationship needs are satisfied in the energy that is created through connection with others. But you aren’t limited to or dependent on how others treat you. You have a relationship with yourself, and you may have a spiritual relationship with a higher being. If there were no other people on the planet, you would instinctively be driven to create special relationships with animals and plants. Potential for relationship is everywhere, and it’s bi-directional. You don’t just get it – you co-create it. That’s why giving so often feels like receiving, and people are often driven to give what they most need from others. It’s a strategy that sometimes works, and works even better if you are aware of your true motive for giving.
To “let go” of the person you are focusing on, you need to do two things:
1. Identify the need you are trying to get met from that particular person.
2. Get that need met outside the relationship, in as many other ways as possible.
Initially, it will seem like there’s no other place to get the need met, or that the other places don’t matter, but this what I call “panic mode”, where your brain stops the creative thinking process and has fallen into the adrenaline driven action process. To create abundance from scarcity, you get your brain working on how to get the need met outside of the relationship you are focusing on, and the way to do that is ask yourself questions. Here are some you can start with:
1. What is the specific feeling I get when this need is met?
2. What are all the situations where I get a similar feeling?
3. How can I co-create something similar (although perhaps not as good) in my other relationships?
4. What can I do in my relationship with myself to get this need met?
Even though some people aren’t as interesting as other people, there are usually enough of the base components available in everyone you meet, so that you can co-create a little bit of what you need in various different people, which is usually the healthiest and most empowering way to get your core relationship needs met.
At a deeper level, you may have to listen hard to the negative voices in your head. Usually, the biggest culprit in unmet relationship needs is that “voice” that hangs out in your head and talks to you all day. If it’s critical and unloving, it tends to suck more out of you than anyone outside of you. Sometimes the best way to get a relationship need met is to be a better friend to yourself.
The basic needs model is simple – but the process is always easier said than done. If you find that the concept I’m writing about makes sense, but you can’t seem to move yourself out of the emotional trap, it might be useful to get some coaching.
I now have an on-line needs assessment available that takes about 20 – 40 minutes to fill out. If you’d like to take a needs assessment, send an e-mail to nahid@aspyrre.com requesting one, and I’d be happy to get you set up.
Copyright © 2007, Nahid Casazza and Aspyrre.
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