“The Best Boss Ever”

As a newbie entering the corporate 9–5 world post-college, I had my own set of expectations of what managers would be like — Maybe it’s from all the TV shows, horror stories, and movies that’s altered my thoughts to create them into this intimidating being. My expectations were that I would need to report to them every little detail, that they would only care about their own career, that they may sometimes take anger out on me, and that I’d always need to seem put together and hide my flaws from them.

Thankfully — All of this soon changed when I met my first boss at my current company who successfully transformed my image of “managers” from a devil to an angel. The first ever meeting with my boss I had on my first day, we had a deep discussion about both of our life values and he genuinely wanted to know what my career and life goals were. I remember exactly what he had said to me that day:

“What are your life goals? It can be anything.. like wanting to becoming the best financial analyst, getting a job at Google, or becoming an Elementary School Advisor.. Whatever it may be, if you’re comfortable sharing with me, I want to know so I could help to shape this experience to your best interest. Let’s take you to that goal.”

I was astounded; From my very first day of work to up until now, I have observed and I am still learning from my boss what qualities magnificent managers possess, and how I’m planning to manage my team members in the future. As cliché as it sounds, here are some top qualities that I believe make great managers:

They care about your future.

Managers shouldn’t expect you (and they shouldn’t be expected) to commit to the current company for the rest of their lives. Let’s be real — we’re not living in the 1990’s. Great managers respect that you have your own set of career and life goals. They want to guide you to best of their abilities to help you achieve them.

They always keep you on your toes.

You should never be bored at work or feel like you’re too comfortable about the responsibilities you have at your company — That means you’re not growing! Great managers always try to challenge you in new ways for you to obtain new skills; They tell you the end goal of new initiatives/projects, but let you have full autonomy of the whole process. Obviously, they are there to back you up and provide guidelines if you need. Though, it’s important to realize that it‘s not solely their responsibility to be always feeding you with a baby spoon — You need to do the ‘expressing’ part to them when you feel that you could take on more challenges for yourself.

They trust you.

Great managers trust you with your work and value your inputs, even if they disagree with it. They realize micromanaging will only act as a stumbling block for you, them, and the whole team in reaching full potential — I view micromanaging as a whopping waste of everyone’s time and energy. Great managers let you have full ownership, have you take pride in your process, and won’t try to control that because they fully trust and respect you.

I remember during my first week of work, every single time I went out to lunch or any event (even Orientation), I had Skype messaged my manager saying “Hey, I’m going to X,Y,Z! I’ll be back in an hour to finish Project X”. When my manager caught onto my habits, he had said to me: “Sally, I greatly appreciate you letting me know, but you have full autonomy and could go out to X,Y,Z any time you want for however long without reporting to me — no one’s timing you and I trust you”. We had both laughed, and I had explained to him on how I thought that was the norm.

They are motivated, curious, and have a growth-mindset.

Great managers are always looking to improve because they are motivated and curious. Because they have more experience than you and they’re your managers, you may sometimes be forgetting the fact that your boss is also in the process of reaching for his/her goals. After all, they are just like you — striving to constantly grow and always finding room for improvement. Whether it be their work or a company-wide process, great managers always question what they could change for the better. Even if they’re already great and are constantly complemented, they know there’s always room to be even better. It’s also one thing to know what could be improved, but another to actually take actions upon it — Great managers realize that curiosity goes a long way and they will take initiative!

They give you constructive feedback.

Great managers deliver productive feedback that makes you aware of what you may have been missing out on. These feedbacks are not meant to hurt you! They ultimately increase your motivation and will allow you to keep you growing — Personally, receiving constructive feedback has been the most helpful to my constant growth and expansion of horizons on different perspectives.

They want YOUR constructive feedback.

While great managers provide you with valuable feedback, they’re also looking for your constructive inputs on them. I know — It sounds intimidating to be the one to deliver feedback to your boss. Trust me on this one though; As I mentioned in my other bullet, great managers trust and respect you. They genuinely want to know if there are areas that they might not be self-aware of and appreciate you for being the ones looking out for them.

They always recognize, and give you credit for your work.

Great managers tremendously appreciate your work and never try to take credit for it. Even if they provided you a sense of direction, they believe that the work you’ve produced is your work — not theirs. They’re happy to see you develop and are thrilled when your work is recognized from other colleagues as well. These moments feel like a “pat on the back” for you and your boss, as both sides feel rewarded — you for knowing that your work is valued and your manager for seeing progress in your development.

Most recently, while my boss and I were in a conference room together working on separate tasks, he received an email from our SVP asking for analysis on a specific topic. As I knew that he already had a lot on his plate, I offered to create the analysis. He instantly showed gratitude and expressed that it was a great idea. Upon completion, he drafted a response to our SVP with the file I sent over to him. As I noticed him typing “Thank you Sally, for putting this together!” at the end of his email, I had looked at him and said: “My pleasure! You don’t need to include that in your email though. I’m right here you know!”. He gave me a puzzled look and responded: “Sally, but you did all the work! I’m keeping it”. Soon after he fired off his email, the SVP had also recognized and showed gratitude to my efforts.

That’s a long way of me saying — you’ll know once you’ve met a great manager. After all, you both are your best advocates who are always looking out for each other. If you haven’t had such a pleasing experience with managers so far and couldn’t learn much from them, you know who not to become and what qualities you should be looking for in your next one. If you are currently managing employees or are on the path to become a manager, I hope this can guide you into what direct reports look for in you. If you have yet to enter the workforce, don’t settle for a manager who you don’t see these qualities in.