Managing Upwards: Building a Mental Model
Tactics you can use so your manager relationship starts working for you
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Today, we continue the series: Managing Upwards. Missed last post? Find it here.
We're going to take a step back to go over broadly what managing upwards involves, and tactics you can use to do it better.
If you're not working for yourself, then you have a manager.
And while a manager's job is to manage you. You also have a role in managing upwards.
This tactic can be thought of as taking extreme ownership over the relationship you have with your manager.
While they may be a good target to complain about, and culturally this may be largely an acceptable disposition to hold; not managing upwards is an abdication.
You are surrendering like a victim to how they treat you and who they are as a person. Any slight is kept in your memories for the next venting session with colleagues, friends, or spouse.
But that doesn't help you win.
So, what does managing upwards look like if you want to take ownership over the outcomes of your manager relationship?
Building the Manager Mental Model
First, it means observing and accepting the personality, strengths, flaws, history, biases, and preferences of your manager.
In every interaction, take the opportunity to consciously soak in information about who they are holistically.
Use 1:1 conversations to ask follow up questions on who they are, their history, their thoughts on a new topic or dilemma at work. Not only do managers often feel better when they get to ramble, it gives you more input to build your mental model.
This practice will help you build a more accurate mental model of how they act and will react in different circumstances.
The Rule of Least Surprise
Similar to managing a meeting of a board of directors, take to heart the rule of least surprise.
Communicate frequently and early so your manager is not surprised when you submit a PR that doesn't line up with the sprint or is shocked when they see you booked vacation for next week last minute.
Many people, managers especially, can get flustered by suddenly encountered deviations from their expectations.
Avoid unnecessary surprises. Bring up the contentious topic and acknowledge that it might be a shock to them. Continue to talk through it with a calm voice. This can often avoid blow ups or loss of trust.
“How can I help you?”
If you've gotten off on the wrong foot, first impressions are hard to fix.
Yet, not impossible. For example, take this tactic which time and again has tended to start to soften managers who may have a less trusting or prickly demeanor towards me.
In these cases, I've started to ask them earnestly about their role, stress they may be under, and lastly ask if there's anything I can do to help with all the burdens on their plate.
Often, the manager will blush and start to let down their guard at an underling taking notice of their emotional needs and offering to take on more work to relief their responsibilities.
9 times out of 10, the task or chore I've been given has been minimal like setting up a retro meeting, mentoring a junior colleague, or taking over writing the team newsletter this time. A small amount of extra work, often soft skills and non-coding, can end up going a long way to build trust and goodwill.
The Benefits of Goodwill
Depending on the manager, once they have extensive trust and goodwill towards you, you will often get a longer leash.
In practice, this looks like less convincing required for internal side projects like code cleanup, refactors, shared library contributions, or vacation approval.
You can even end up having the manager openly offer to go to bat for you against HR, expense report auditors, or other teams who may be causing unnecessary hassles.
Getting your manager on your side has many benefits outside of the obvious impact on promotion.
Once you’ve reached your peak target level in promotions, you can bet that staying on your manager’s good side is how you maximize time for your Step 2 wifi-money. More on that later…
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A coffee a month for proven tactics and strategies to land your next promo faster… that sounds like its worth the price of admission.
My colleagues smiling at their bigger paychecks after following my advice and getting early promotions certainly seem to think so.
There's a lot more we need to cover if you're going to make it.
Stay toon'd.
- BowTied Fullstack
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