How to be effectively managed?
A managed and manager view of how to extract the best from your manager and achieve your career goals
Before turning into a Software Engineering Manager, I had a different vision about the relationship between managers and their managed ones. A few months in as a manager, I started noticing the different profiles and ways to be managed.
I realized how factors such as past managers, experience, proactivity, personality, seniority, and others, could affect the way that particular person was managed and how it would impact the effectiveness of the manager-managed relationship.
There are plenty of articles on how to be a manager, tips for leadership, and so on, but few on how you can and should leverage your manager to achieve your career goals regardless of how your manager acts.
Curiously, as I thought about the subject, I came upon The managers' path book, a leadership guide, which also helped me to consolidate my perspective on the matter. So, I've started writing this article aiming to share — in a structured way — some useful advice that has helped me to get the best of my managers, my career, and my team members.
However, I started writing it about a year ago (middle of 2019), but I actually stopped because I felt the need to validate my own feelings, applying some changes in my manager and managed view, and getting more inputs about it. One year later, I really see that some points have been confirmed and some actions are making a huge difference in the manager-managed relation.
Therefore, the following topics cover means to learn how to grow in the career using your manager on your favor more often, based on my experience. It's not a step-by-step to apply, but instead, topics that you should pay attention to, maybe later check the references to deep dive in one of them:
- Take the driver's seat of your career
- Treat your manager as a coach
- Recognize the different management styles
- Use effectively 1:1s
Take the driver’s seat of your career
The owner of your career is you! It sounds obvious, right? However, there are countless times that we don't assume our driver's seat and let others' opinions and timing make our choices.
How many times have you waited for your manager to suggest something that you have already been thinking of yourself?
How many times you didn't share your long term goals and wishes for your career?
I could go on and on with these questions… but I think you got the idea. Despite your seniority, your manager style, your occupation field, you should always practice self-awareness and career ownership, establishing and communicating short and long term goals.
Wait... I'm not saying that you need to define all steps and have a 10 years plan. We live in a fast-changing world, you can and will change your mind from time to time. But it's important to have a north star to pursue because this will help you to make decisions and grow fast.
There are two most important things in order to put yourself on the driver’s seat:
Self-awareness
Self-awareness is the ability to see yourself clearly and objectively through reflection and introspection. — Courtney E. Ackerman
It's how you look at yourself with empathy to deeply understand what are you doing, how you feel, what do you want to do in the future, and make it all conscious.
Why is this important to my career?
Only by understanding yourself, your strengths, weaknesses, desires, values, comfort zone, and so on, you will know where your true north lies and use it in your favor.
How can I improve my self-awareness?
First, you need to understand that self-awareness is totally different from the imposter syndrome. Having the inner voice telling that you're failing and don't deserve it, it's NOT self-awareness. Actually, building and working in your self-awareness prevents the imposter syndrome.
Unfortunately, there's no cookie-cutter solution for "how to build self-awareness in 1 day". It depends on you. Each journey is unique and there are a lot of paths to get there. I've read and tried many things to boost my self-awareness and you can find some links at the end of the article that you can use as a reference for your journey. In short, the whole idea is to take the time to look within and realize your true self.
Advocate for yourself
So, you know your goals, your strengths, and weakness. Is that it? No! More important than knowing it, it’s the process of sharing and acting on them! You must share it with others, mainly with your manager, but also with some peers to gain perspective — and some valuable feedback too.
When you start advocating your career, is the moment you that you actually are in the driver’s seat of your career, as Camille also said in her book:
“Developing a sense of ownership and authority for your own experiences at work, and not relying on your manager to set the entire tone for your relationship, is an important step in owning your career and workplace happiness.”
— Camille Fournier, The Manager's Path
So, when you realize your ownership and your power to do it, you also need to start seeing your manager as a coach and not a “judge” — more on the next topic.
Treat your manager as a coach
As Julie Zhuo said in the foreword of The Art of Meeting with Your Manager:
"Your manager is someone who is on your side, who wants you to succeed, and who is usually willing to invest their time and energy into helping you."
When you start seeing your manager as your coach, you realize that you should not be treating her/him as a judge. You must not be afraid to be judged by your manager — If you don’t feel safe speaking to your manager, look for someone that gives you that safety. — instead, you should be able to show all you have in mind and leverage her/him to create and share opportunities, give feedback, and help you to prioritize your next steps.
Be curious, ask questions
When you stop seeing your manager as a judge or someone that "knows more than you", it gives you the safe space to make questions without questioning your self if it's "reasonable" question.
First of all, all questions are reasonable just by the fact that you are having it. So, ask questions: why? why? why?
By making these questions you can be able to leverage the manager and contributor interaction as learning and teaching time. It's a two-way street. The questions can help you to understand the rationale of the decisions, can make you learn a new thing, or, even, you can bring to the table a problem or alternative solution that wasn't being considered. Yes, as you can learn just as well as teach something to your manager.
Aligning Priorities: use your time wisely
At work, you are the owner of your time, you choose your priorities, but this reflects directly in what and how you deliver for your team and for the company. Sometimes you can think that you are rocking and, then, realize that it was a total waste of time. So, it's really important to leverage your manager to align priorities.
You are not asking permission, you are using your manager to confirm that you're in a good way, having feedbacks, tips, and even doing something that can help you to be more effective. Maybe, your manager has already been in your shoes and have some learnings to share with you. Maybe, you need your managers' help to align something with the entire team or company. It's how your manager can help you "Impact more with the same amount of time".
obs: The "depth" of priorities alignment changes based on your seniority.
Build a good relationship with your manager
It's important to have a good relationship with your manager and this doesn't mean being friends and going to drink together (what is also not a problem), but the goal here it's to remember that your manager is also a human being, it's good to build mutual respect, transparency, trust, and open relationship.
This responsibility belongs to both of you. When you achieve it with your manager, you will be so much easier for both of you to grow together. Go to the references to look for some content on how to help to build it.
It's also a headstart to understand your manager's management style and how to use it effectively — lets to the next topic.
Recognize the different management styles
You don't need to be an expert in management styles. You can simply observe how your manager handles things, how one likes to make questions, how she/he likes to approach the team members, the other managers, and stakeholders.
By understanding how one manages, you can understand how to be more effective in this interaction. For example, when it's better to send that email, how to approach a difficult situation, how to give visibility to your achievements.
The same happens about knowing your manager's strengths and weaknesses. As a manager, I think this part is very important to pass to the team member. As a team member, it's important to observe and gather the topics of strengths that you can "consume" the knowledge and the weakness that you can give feedback, or you can exchange ideas with what you know. As I've already said, It's a two-way street, use it! Sometimes you can also observe other managers' styles as well to give a better perspective by comparison and even give feedback and work more effectively.
"Your manager is human and has good days and tough days, just like you. This means you can get very different answers according to when you ask a question. Working successfully with a manager will require that you get to know them personally, and know how and when to adjust your working style to be more effective with your manager" — Keith Tatley, The Art of Meeting with Your Manager
Use effectively 1:1s
One-on-one meetings are not for managers. You're the owner of it. You should be the pilot bringing the content that it's relevant for you at that moment. For that, it's really important to prepare the agenda that you want for the 1:1 meeting beforehand. It’s key to extracting value from the meeting.
There is no "correct" way to do it. You will also find the best fit for your moment and your manager. Note the things during it's happening and, then, it will be easier to prepare your 1:1 agenda.
Bring to the table the visibility of what you're doing, ask for feedback, align your goals and your long-term priorities. And, the most important bring to the conversation difficult topics. Use this safe space to clear up your difficult doubts, to be transparent of your issues, report workspace problems, and so on.
"Your manager is not a mind reader! If you don’t tell them, don’t expect them to know. Even great managers struggle to understand what their people need when they’re tight-lipped"-7 Essential Tips for Effective 1 on 1 Meetings with Your Manager
Try it and assume the ownership in your one-on-one meeting! It will not change suddenly, but keep all of it in mind and try to do it, I bet you will see good results.
And.. don't forget it's also really cool to give feedback, positive or constructive, for your manager in the 1:1 meetings. It will help both of you. Even feedbacks about the 1:1 meeting. It’s paramount that 1:1s should serve you (better than you the manager, even) so if the current structure/content/timing is not yielding any result for you, also bring that to the table. Both you and your manager might not know what the right answer to that is, but it will at least incur in trying new methods.
So, wrapping up all that we learned here. It's really important to assume the protagonism of your one career, and leverage your manager to achieve a hyper-growth professional path. So, take at least one of these topics and commit to applying it in your work, study the references I added here for you! Eager to listen to how this applied to you! 🤓
Tks for reading! I’m always open to receive feedback, recommendations, or questions, feel free to contact me!!
Pamela Peixinho, Software Engineering Manager @ QuintoAndar
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pamepeixinho
Twitter: https://twitter.com/pamepeixinho
GitHub: https://github.com/pamepeixinho
More articles that I've written related to management:
My last name is LittleFish, “sea” you later! 😉
If you’d like to be a part of and help shape awesome processes like the ones described here, join us!
References
Be in the driver’s seat of your career
Managing Yourself: How to Calibrate Your Own Strengths and Weaknesses by Julie Zhuo
The manager's path by Camille Fournier
How to Talk about Yourself in the Best Possible Way by Julie Zhuo
Co-opting traditional management skills for self-management by Optimini
Mindset: The new psychology of success by Carol S. Dweck
Treat your manager as a coach
7 Reasons You Should Be a Coach, Not a Boss by Business News Daily Editor
The Power of Asking ‘Why?’: How It Makes Employees Think and Grow by Lee Froschheiser
Aligning Your Priorities With Your Manager’s Expectations by Keith Tatley
Great at Work: How Top Performers Do Less, Work Better, and Achieve More by Morten T. Hansen
Recognize the different management styles
Understanding Your Boss by University of Guelph
Why It’s Important To Manage Your Boss by Derwin Dexter
SPOT A GOOD MANAGER BY ASKING THESE QUESTIONS
David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants by Malcolm Gladwell
Use effectively your 1:1
The Art of Meeting with Your Manager by Julie Zhuo and Keith Tatley
(this handbook has a questionary that says of 1:1 levels and helps you improve it.)
How to Have a Successful One-on-One With Your Boss (Even if You Don’t Get Along) by Ximena Vengoechea
One-On-Ones With Your Manager: Here’s How to Prepare and Make the Most of Them by Manuela Bárcenas
74 Questions to Ask in One on Ones with a Manager by Lighthouse
7 ways to prepare for an effective one-on-one meeting with your manager by Claire Lew
7 Essential Tips for Effective 1 on 1 Meetings with Your Manager by Lighthouse Site
1-on-1s for engaged employees: How good managers run them by Impraise site
