How to manage a micro-manager
Not every leadership challenge comes from managing down – sometimes the real difficulty lies in managing up. A particularly difficult work dynamic is that while you’ve built your leadership style on trust, autonomy and mutual respect, your own boss is, in fact, a micromanager!
It gets even more complicated if your boss starts questioning your approach, perhaps suggesting your team aren’t working hard enough, or implying that you should be more like them as a leader – ‘strong’, ‘high challenge’, ‘purposeful’ (all euphemisms for their awful micromanagement). So what do you do when you’re caught between your leadership values and a boss who want you to adopt theirs?
'But I'm just trying to help…'
Let’s be clear, nothing annoys people more than being micromanaged. It makes many of us hostile, disengaged and sends us on a hunt for a new job quicker than you can say, ‘get out of my grill.’
However, the people who are micromanagers very rarely see themselves as one. They genuinely believe they’re helping. They think it’s a good thing they’re across every detail, and that without them, the whole place would go to ruin. This means that those of us with more successful leadership instincts often have to do a bit of education to help them to see that they’re wrong.
Re-hab for micromanagers
If your boss starts suggesting your team are lazy or that you need to pay closer attention to them, consider using a line like this: “That’s actually a management style I’ve used in the in the past, but I got some feedback that it wasn’t getting the best out of people. When I switched to a more trusting approach, I noticed an almost overnight uptick in the enthusiasm and output of my team.”
Even if that’s not strictly true, I think a little white lie in any case is going to help underline the point that evidence shows a more trusting approach is more successful, without having to quote hard facts at them (although plenty are available if you do want to use evidence - just Google ‘benefits of giving team members autonomy’ or look up the Job Characteristics Model by Hackman and Oldham which spells it out clearly).
Ask for evidence
Ask If your boss continues to badger you about your management style or keeps pushing the narrative that your team are underperforming, ask them to be specific and justify with metrics where they think your team aren’t working well, so that you can work on these areas specifically. Chances are, they won’t be able to. It may not put the matter to bed, but it will make it hard for them to bring it up repeatedly if they don’t have evidence to back it up.
Find things in common with your boss's approach
Look at the words your boss uses to describe their own leadership style and find ways to use them to describe your own. Find examples of where your approach is also ‘strong’, ‘high challenge’ and ‘purposeful’ but in a way that gives support and autonomy – e.g. perhaps you held your own on a big decision in which a team member wanted to go a different way, or maybe you showed real purpose in tying all your team’s objectives back to the company’s mission.
Ultimately, you might not change your boss, but you can help them see that your approach is working with your team and view it in a more positive light. It may also cause them to reflect on their own management style (here’s hoping!).
3 resources to help deal with a micromanager:
HBR's advice on how to stop being micromanaged yourself: Stop being micromanaged
How to check whether you’re a micromanager: A good reality check
How giving employees autonomy can help them to flourish: A useful PWC report
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