3 Things To Make Your Manager Worship You

3 things to make your manager worship you This is not your ordinary career site. I help the corporate worker who toils away in the company cubicle make career transitions. You want to do your job well, following all the rules -- . The career transitions where I can help you center on three critical career areas: How to land a job, succeed in a job, and build employment security. Top 10 Posts on Categories When I worked as an “individual contributor,” I always received very good ratings, recommendations and comments from my managers. I thought I was just doing my job. But, when I became a manager, I found out that my definition of “doing my job” was quite different than most other people’s definition of doing my job. Here are three things that will make your manager worship you. Too many of us get a task from their manager they think they understand and then happily turn in the work one week later â€" only to find out it is nothing close to what the manager wanted. To be fair, often the manager doesn’t know what the output of the work needs to look like, but not prototyping your work means neither of you get to correct expectations. Great employees do a portion of the work to completion (say five slides of a 50-slide presentation…), take it to their manager and ask if this is the right stuff for the task or project. Is it the right level of detail for the audience? Is it the right format? Does it have too many bullet points and not enough pictures? Taking a completed example of the work to the manager will clear up tons of misunderstood expectations. And your personal brand will be “proactive” rather than “never gets everything right.” We’re all interconnected in the work we do. When I’m done with something, it needs to go on to the next step for that person (your manager) to do their part. Then, perhaps, it goes further when your manager is done with the work as well. Now you don’t deliver your work on time â€" even if you’ve done the prototyping of your work â€" and you then force everyone else along this chain of deliverables to change their expectations about how much time they have to do their work. Now they have to work longer hours to honor their time commitment. Now they don’t get to do the last quality check on their work because they didn’t have the time. Getting the work done on time means your personal brand is “you can count on me to get the work done” rather than “never does anything on time so build in an extra week if you don’t want to go crazy.” Most people wait way too long before delivering bad news or asking for help when they don’t think they can get done with their work. Sometimes it’s an “I can do this” attitude that blinds the person to the reality of the time. Sometimes it is an unwillingness to ask for help because it will make the person look weak (what’s your biggest weakness??). Sometimes it is an unwillingness to give your manager a heads-up if something bad happens such as another manager bad-mouthing the department and that person’s manager going to talk to your manager about it. Good managers want bad news early. They want it early because then there is still time to fix it and deliver stuff on time. They want it early because when you “dig up your own mud,” you can initiate actions to fix the problem. Then when asked about the problem, the manager can say they already know about it and have done these X steps to go fix it. And they get the reputation of proactive and on top of their business. Bad managers don’t want to hear bad news and will label you with a “negative” attitude when all you are doing is trying to make sure you get your stuff done on time and with quality. So you’ll need to know your manager here on delivering bad news. With good managers, delivering bad news early means your personal brand is “proactive” and “wants to get the work done on time by eliminating roadblocks.” With good managers, delivering bad news late means your personal brand is “unable to communicate bad news” and “doesn’t understand the work well enough to know when the project is in trouble.” Wouldn’t it be a lot more fun if your manager worshiped your work? Yeah it correct.. Good managers delivering bad news late means your personal brand is “unable to communicate bad news”.. Thanks for sharing this update.. Reply […] wrong, wrong. Need to change this and this and this. A great all-night party that one was. Not. Prototype your work. […] Reply I agree on “know your manager”. And be wise on how and when to deliver bad news. Some managers would not appreciate the breaking of bad news in a meeting filled with other HODs. It may look bad on him/her. Reply But at the same time it is important that the guy does not over depend on the manager. Here this is also possible that the person is not confident enough and approaching his manager. Having said that I too believe that communication in the early stages is better. There could be a better solution to it, also the worry that you take is not that important as far as the project is concerned. A good manager as said. can help you to solve your problems by early analysis. If you are late, you are giving him a tight schedule to solve it. Reply Well, then, go add the link to Facebook. Anyone can do it. Reply That's nice. This isn't that kind of web site… Reply I really appreciate your advice on 3 things to make your manager worship you and i want to suggest that such word and others should be sent to face book for all to benefit. Reply hi i need a journal and a review on any topic on motivation or compensation. Reply Very happy to have found my little corner on the big Internet! I agree with you on having potential solutions â€" but I had a manager that said don't bring bad news unless you propose solutions â€" and then he criticized me in my performance review for “having all the answers.” Then I stopped offering solutions so that, in his wisdom and experience, he could provide the answers for me. That worked. Lesson: know your manager first! Reply Scot, Came across CubeRules most recently and could not agree more with your third point: “You deliver bad news early.” Indeed, a former boss of mine used to say “Bad news doesn't get any better with age.” I've shared this bit of work wisdom with co-workers and subordinates over the years as well. When delivering “bad news” I would also suggest providing some potential solutions for the crisis. Doing so not only helps your boss, but demonstrates your problem solving capabilities. Thanks Scot. Reply As a former sales manager, I absolutely agree with youâ€"following this advice keeps everyone on the same page, and you come across as someone who’s reliable and competent, and it will help to raise your visibility at work (always a good thing). As a medical sales recruiter, I wrote about that, and would like to offer a few more tips: http://www.phcconsulting.com/WordPress/2009/04/17/how-to-raise-your-profile-within-your-organization/ Reply This is not your ordinary career site. I help the corporate worker who toils away in the company cubicle make career transitions. You want to do your job well, following all the rules â€" . The career transitions where I can help you center on three critical career areas: How to land a job, succeed in a job, and build employment security. policies The content on this website is my opinion and will probably not reflect the views of my various employers. 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