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Showing posts with label bosses. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bosses. Show all posts
How your Boss talks to his/her Superior: #8 - The Minister
The Minister differs from the Lieutenant in three key ways. Firstly, they have their own agenda, and enough power and/or a weak enough Superior to pursue it independently. Secondly, they have reasonable expectations of the Superior’s job in the near future and are brave enough to try and encourage that. Reagans, Hitlers, Kennedys and Krushchevs are all prone to have Ministers rather than Lieutenants. Thirdly, it is often blurred exactly who is working to whom. The strongest Ministers with the weakest Superiors frequently have managed to get the Superior facilitating their own agenda rather than the usual way around.
How your Boss talks to his/her Superior: #7 - The Lieutenant
Sometimes your boss will be a true Extension (or maybe a Praetorian) of the Superior. You can generally spot this because there will appear to be a natural relationship between the two, without any of the curious or artificial giveaway-behaviours of the other types. Again, Maos, Thatchers and Saddams are most likely to have Lieutenants. This can be very good news. If you are nicely ensconced as a Praetorian of your boss, and that same or similar relationship applies up the chain, you are likely to find yourself brought into contact with the Superior in a positive way, and possibly even begin to be treated as an Extension of the Superior instead of just your boss: promotion is just a stratagem away
How your Boss talks to his/her Superior: #6 - The Agent-on-Earth
Sometimes your boss will quite clearly be a Loyalist of the Superior, charged with finding out what is actually going on. This is particularly likely if the Superior is a Thatcher or Mao. It is also possible with Saddams, in which case you are safe enough if the Agent-on-Earth is your direct boss, but be very careful otherwise not go give any information away.
Their mission on earth is not to achieve anything, but to try and find out what is actually going on: always a serious problem for Superiors (because no one ever wants to tell them anything bad). In the presence of the Superior, the Agent-on-Earth will often be the minute-taker of the meeting, or the guy who prepared the agenda, or worst-of-all, the guy passing notes and periodically taking the lead in questioning. Look out for situations where this has clearly been set up in advance.
Their mission on earth is not to achieve anything, but to try and find out what is actually going on: always a serious problem for Superiors (because no one ever wants to tell them anything bad). In the presence of the Superior, the Agent-on-Earth will often be the minute-taker of the meeting, or the guy who prepared the agenda, or worst-of-all, the guy passing notes and periodically taking the lead in questioning. Look out for situations where this has clearly been set up in advance.
How your Boss talks to his/her Superior: #5 - The Press-Officer
Expected at all times to express the Superior’s opinion. With Superior’s who are weak on the party-line, or just weak, particularly with Reagans and Krushchevs, the Superior will usually ensure that questions in this area (or most areas) are thrown over to the Press-Officer. Phrases such as “where do we stand on that one, Jack?” and “do you have the latest on this?” give the game away. Be careful not to confuse the Press-Officer, who is just a voice, with the following types (Minister, Lieutenant, Agent on Earth) who have real power
How your Boss talks to his/her Superior: #4 - The Child
A surprisingly frequent visitor, the Child (an exaggeratedly emotional Dependent when in the presence of the Superior in front of an audience) has a self-esteem which seems completely determined by the Superior’s responses on a minute-by-minute basis. Merely being engaged in public conversation by the Superior makes them blossom, while being praised makes them gibber with gratitude. Being rebuked however, can often bring them near to tears. This is useful as it usually means they can’t speak for several minutes for fear of cracking voice, or actually have to leave a meeting in need of an emergency bathroom visit, giving you the opportunity to speak without your boss as an audience. For some reason, (possibly connected with their power-as-aphrodisiac aspiriations?), Kennedys seem to have an unusual high birthrate of Child reactions.
How your Boss talks to his/her Superior: #3 - The Bureaucrat
The Bureacrat always carries files full of detail to discussions with the Superior (or in its more modern version, the Technoprat, carries around PDAs, laptops, the latest in mobile-phone technology) and resorts to hiding in them whenever addressed. “Let me see, we did 17 of those on Tuesday, 43 on Wednesday, 2032 month-to-date, so it’s going pretty well” is a characteristic response.
When called to action, the response is to make a note on a ToDo list (usually a special pad specially ruled for the purpose) and reply “OK, we’ll do a preliminary study this week and get back to you with a more detailed response.” Make sure you recognise actions which will be coming your way later if this happens in your presence, so that you can either do them, or have made a plan to avoid or amend them, before they actually arrive (in memo or email form) in a couple of days time.
How your Boss talks to his/her Superior: #2 - The Slave
Usually very nervous in tone (you may even have seen slaves who tremble or sweat slightly). Every utterance from the Superior is supported with, often excessive, approving body-language, and as soon as a suggestion is made, it is greeted with “we’ll get on to it right away” or similar. In the worst case, the Slave will delegate on the spot, so watch out for the “Jack, can you see that Superior gets it by Friday please”. Incidentally, do not argue if this happens to you. Just agree in public, and then if Friday is a ridiculous deadline, or the task is impossible anyway, go and discuss it with your boss now.
If the Slave has missed a deadline, or failed to achieve something, and is caught out by the Superior, the Slave will always cover with “we’ve got a few problems with that right now, but it should be done early next week”. Whatever happens, the Slave will never tell the Superior that something he/she has said is wrong/impossible/stupid; rather they will try to make it right/feasible/magnificently-farsighted.
How your Boss talks to his/her Superior: #1 - The Creep
Most people have seen this one in action and can recognise it instantly. However, just for the record, the technique at the kind of reasonably senior level that might be the case here usually involves the boss referring to meetings or projects in the recent past at which both Boss and Superior were present, and reminiscing over highlights of the superior’s performance. Phrases like “I think you got them over a barrel when you said…”, “that decision, which I thought was rather risky actually, turned out fantastically well didn’t it?” and so on, are characteristic. Especially with men, a kind of chummy deference sets the tone.
Understand the relationship between your Boss and his/her Superior
Superiors (see previous posts) are often quite different when acting as immediate bosses instead of visiting nobility. Remember that your own boss...
- ...will not see them as a remote figure in the way that most others do
- ...is concerned about them as a boss in the same way that you are concerned about the actions of your own boss
- ...has evolved a strategy for dealing with them, which may well involve quite different behaviour from the behaviour displayed to you in “boss-mode”
The last is the key point, and so it is worth a brief discussion of survival styles available to a boss when working for each kind of Superior. A little observation when the opportunity presents itself (i.e. while you are being silent in the Superior’s presence) should quickly reveal your boss’s choice. We begin by classifying these boss-survival styles, and then consider which of them work which each kind of Superior. They are:
The next posts will look briefly at each in turn. Don't make a fool of yourself
The instruction “do not make a fool of yourself” appears obvious. Clearly, don’t make yourself look stupid. However there is a more subtle side to this. Only with the Hitler and the Krushchev is there any mileage in trying to make yourself look good.
With all other types, they will ignore/forget if you say something intelligent, but notice and maybe even remember if you say something foolish. Because of the potential difference in grade/perspective/age between you and them, what appears intelligent to you may well appear foolish in their eyes. It is very easy to chip in a pert remark in a meeting, only to find all eyes focussed on you while the Superior in question expresses an alternative view which makes your remark look extremely naïve.
Be extra careful with the Thatcher, who will follow up the foolishness, and with the Saddam who may well simply order your execution afterwards (or in corporate speak, become a block to your chances of promotion within the next decade or two).
This leads on to a related point. Superiors are unlikely to be directly involved in any discussions about your pay, grade or general opportunities. They do, however, tend to have to sign any changes off. And if you make a fool of yourself, they won’t; at the very least they will obstruct or delay it, and may well have the power to block your chances permanently. On the other hand, even if they remember anything positive you might have done in their presence, it is not going to lead to a corresponding “seems good, I think we should even give her another couple of thousand over and above the recommended figure” type of response. They are not involved in the evaluation, only in the yes/no decision at the end.
So, when the Superior is around:
- speak when spoken to
- be brief, and stick to the party line
- do not try to stand out
- be seen and not heard
- and above all, don't end up looking a fool... unless you have a cunning plan
- and above all, don't end up looking a fool... unless you have a cunning plan
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Superiors: The Thatcher
Usually, but not always female. The Thatcher is focussed on an image of themselves as a “leader”. Their self-image varies, but often it will include needing to appear tough, decisive, in-charge. Points to note:
a) if you express an opinion, or agree to do something, the Thatcher will follow it up. He or she may well bypass the normal chain of command in doing so, so the protection which might normally be offered by your Boss is limited. Do not make the mistake, therefore, of saying or agreeing to do something which you know your boss would be unhappy about.
b) the Thatcher offers the best chance for you to employ the “getting rid of your boss” high-risk strategy described in another post. Thatchers do not tolerate fools. Of course this means if you get it wrong, the axe will fall even harder on your own head
c) appearing tough and decisive requires that you maintain a firm line and stick to it. This usually means delaying selecting this line until the last possible minute, so that it has the best chance of being correct and not being overtaken by events. A genuine Thatcher quote: “one thing I’ve learned [in politics]. Never take a decision until you have to.” Be very careful not to find yourself in the wrong camp when this happens. The besr way to do this is to avoid expressing any meaningful opinion if at all possible. Delegate expressing opinions up to your Boss.
a) if you express an opinion, or agree to do something, the Thatcher will follow it up. He or she may well bypass the normal chain of command in doing so, so the protection which might normally be offered by your Boss is limited. Do not make the mistake, therefore, of saying or agreeing to do something which you know your boss would be unhappy about.
b) the Thatcher offers the best chance for you to employ the “getting rid of your boss” high-risk strategy described in another post. Thatchers do not tolerate fools. Of course this means if you get it wrong, the axe will fall even harder on your own head
c) appearing tough and decisive requires that you maintain a firm line and stick to it. This usually means delaying selecting this line until the last possible minute, so that it has the best chance of being correct and not being overtaken by events. A genuine Thatcher quote: “one thing I’ve learned [in politics]. Never take a decision until you have to.” Be very careful not to find yourself in the wrong camp when this happens. The besr way to do this is to avoid expressing any meaningful opinion if at all possible. Delegate expressing opinions up to your Boss.
Superiors: The Hitler
At the opposite end of the spectrum from the Reagan, the Hitler simply cannot resist demonstrating his/her superior knowledge of every aspect of detail. Often fickle, so that policy consists of whatever the Hitler is thinking today. Points to note:
a) do not try to argue with the Hitler. He/she is right anyway. Fortunately, the Hitler will move on tomorrow to be interested in another area, and forget whatever he/she said today. Occasionally a little more organised, and therefore with some slight danger of following up. Agree with your Boss a line to take with, or brief memo recording your response to, instructions from the Hitler, just in case of the follow-up question.
b) your Boss will be fairly terrified of the Hitler, and either fawning or anxious for its attentions to move elsewhere. You can use this to your advantage with care, by reminding your boss occasionally of the Hitler’s interest in your own pet area, if you are fortunate enough for this to be demonstrated
a) do not try to argue with the Hitler. He/she is right anyway. Fortunately, the Hitler will move on tomorrow to be interested in another area, and forget whatever he/she said today. Occasionally a little more organised, and therefore with some slight danger of following up. Agree with your Boss a line to take with, or brief memo recording your response to, instructions from the Hitler, just in case of the follow-up question.
b) your Boss will be fairly terrified of the Hitler, and either fawning or anxious for its attentions to move elsewhere. You can use this to your advantage with care, by reminding your boss occasionally of the Hitler’s interest in your own pet area, if you are fortunate enough for this to be demonstrated
Superiors: The Reagan
The Reagan has a completely hands-off style, which contents itself with setting policy and letting those beneath carry it out. It may not be clear if the Reagan actually sets policy – it may well be too stupid for this -, but it can certainly spout it convincingly. Main points to note from your perspective as a relative junior:
a) you will not be consulted directly about policy, and your opinion will not carry weight, so don’t bother trying. You will just look naïve
b) you can expect to be treated with absent courtesy
c) the Reagan will see you simply as an extension of your Boss, regardless of your actual situation
Dealing with more remote Superiors
Three things matter when dealing with your boss's Superior(s):
The next posts look at each in turn
- Do not make a fool of yourself
- Do NOT make a fool of your boss
- Understand the relationship between Boss and Superior
The next posts look at each in turn
Disposing of your boss
Sometimes your boss ceases to be useful. He/she stops gives you the things you want, whatever they may be. If that happens, your boss is broken you and need to find a replacement.
There are three main ways to dispose of your boss:
i) change jobs, by obtaining an inside track on a selection process to a more desirable role, (rather similarly to getting promoted above).
ii) change boss by persuading an alternative candidate to acquire you to their team, assuming your corporate culture permits it. A generally accepted way of going about this is to take a secondment/placement which you somehow fail to return from.
iii) get the boss removed.
Option iii) is a high-risk strategy. If you really want to try it, here is how to go about it, but please read the health warning on the packet.
Step 1: find out what your boss’s relationship to his/her Superior is.
Step 2: If he/she is a Loyalist, forget it now. If he/she is an Extension, you have to become a more competent Extension than your boss, or find a candidate for that position. If he/she is in another role, you stand a greater chance because they will be considered dispensable.
Step 3: establish your own relationship with your boss’s Superior. This is high-risk. You will need to become a Loyalist. If your own boss has any wits about them, they will undoubtedly block this, quite possibly in a way that is detrimental to you.
Step 4: divide your boss’s responsibilities into three parts.
Part 1: anything which overlaps with, or is delegated to you. Leave this well alone. You do not under any circumstances want to cast any doubt in the general competence of your boss’s team in these areas, in case that doubt leaks over you. Under normal circumstances you will of course be promoting the success of this area in any case.
Part 2: anything which is well within your boss’s core competency, or about which you know little, or which is handled by very competent people
Part 3: the rest, presumably your boss’s weakest areas.
Step 5: slowly arrange for doubt to be cast over your boss’s competency in this area. If you have succeeded with step 3, you may be able to do this directly. If not, you may have to find a disaffected Specialist or Extension in the relevant area whose discontent you can cultivate. Bring to the boil and allow to simmer slowly over a hot executive.
And hey presto, your boss is incompetent, and provided you have handled step 4 correctly, you should be in pole position for the job yourself. Just to repeat: don’t try this at home without a parent or guardian present. Also, remember that it is better to work for an incompetent boss than an incompetent interfering boss.
Dealing with your immediate Boss
Your relationship with respect to your own boss is of paramount importance, as it is likely that he or she will be involved in almost any decision process which determines whether you acquire the plums or the prunes. A key question then, is what role you should play in this relationship.
The answer to this should be apparent from the previous section on staff. You need to
a) benefit from your own boss landing desirable work which he or she will delegate down. So the second best option is that you want to be an Extension staff member of your boss
b) benefit from your boss treating you as a confidant, and providing you with confidential information. So the better option is that you want to try to be a Loyalist. It goes without saying that you should want to be a Praetorian, not a Dependent.
The Praetorian role is the key. It is essential to remember that you are not there to be useful to your boss; your boss is there to be useful to you. If he or she can no longer deliver (to you) then it is time to dispose of them.
Disposing of your boss is covered in the next post.
Disposing of your boss is covered in the next post.
Assuming your boss is actually useful to you, so you prefer not to go for immediate disposal, how do you exploit his/her usefulness? Proxy-trade agreements are the usual method. They work like this as follows. Frequently your boss will need particular information, or will need certain actions carrying out, but cannot be seen do be doing their own dirty work. Meetings can present great opportunities for this – see the whole sections on meetings in later posts, particularly the sections on using meetings to block things. The method by which the information is obtained, or the meeting role taken on, will require you to be appointed by your boss to a position or task which will be useful to you on an ongoing basis: secretary to a certain decision making committee for example.
The more effective you are in performing the dirty work required by your boss, and equally important, the more efficient you are in returning with useful information (e.g. that Peter sat next to Flopsy and Mopsy in a particular meeting), the more trusted you will become. This will tend to lead on to higher status assignments, where it eventually becomes anomalous that someone as junior as you has a position in such a senior group or project. This is easily resolved: you have to be made more senior.
Another area of boss-exploitation to be managed carefully is your Loyalist role. Be very careful that you really are a Praetorian and not a Dependent. Why? Because the whip-hand swaps hands between these two roles. If you are useful enough, your boss will be keen to retain you. If he/she thinks you are a Dependent, your retention will be managed via intangibles: love, attention, listening and similar useless baggage. You need your retention to be managed via salary, promotions, listening (to you hint about needing a company car). Tactically, imply that your loyalty is of course never in doubt, but continuing not to bite the hand depends on the hand feeding. Avoid your boss on Monday mornings and Friday afternoons, as this is when bosses look for Dependents to most betray their dependence. If you start to feel you need his/her attention frequently, you need to take a long hard look at your motivations: who exactly is the boss here? It should be you: if it isn’t, you need to make some changes.
Assuming your are confident of your Praetorian status, and furthermore confident that it is your boss that it is dependent on you, you need to frequently hint that your loyalty is in question. No full-blown “if you don’t gimme loadsamoney I’m off” threats of course. Just gentle blackmail. Read the trade press regularly and visibly (assuming it contains job adverts). Refer occasionally to being happy about being paid the market-rate for the job (doesn’t matter if you are or not, bosses always worry that they are unable to pay the market rate for the job. This extends right up to the board-room: just look at the stories in the press about executive pay, which really boil down to the chairman’s paranoia that he/she needs to pay the chief-executive the market-rate). Note not “unhappy”, but “happy”. Keep it subtle but reasonable. Refer to your grade a lot - phrases such as “the group of us on grade 7” are appropriate – but try and include comparisons which imply your grade is too low. The phrase to try for is “the group of us on grade 7, even including old Bill”. Everyone knows old Bill is a four-star plank, so it is ridiculous that you are rated as lowly as him. But don’t say that. Just leave that judgement to your boss. He/she has to buy in to the premise of regarding “grade 7” as a group to follow the conversation through. That in itself guarantees that your boss will evaluate this group in his/her mind, and make the comparisons. All this is designed to reinforce your “keep feeding me” message, without overdoing it, a strategy known as Retention Blackmail.
OK, you’ve made sure the emotion is ironed out and you are a Praetorian. Now how about the opposite balance? Are you sure you are a Praetorian and not just an Extension. An Extension is a good thing to be (are you sure you are not a Minion or Inferior for heaven’s sake? Just checking!), but not as good as a Praetorian. Why? Because Extensions are unable to indulge in the Retention Blackmail strategy with anywhere near the same effectiveness.
Extensions are just that: Extensions. They perform a role that the boss could perform just as well, if not better, if he/she did not have better things to do. If an Extension departs then a) the boss can do it themselves for a while and b) replacement is a relatively straightforward task. Praetorians, on the other hand, have access to areas the boss cannot reach, or more relevantly be seen to reach. And that access is hard to replace. Extensions often have another disadvantage: they tend to meet the boss in more formal and/or professional encounters. Loyalists are expected to chat, that’s what they’re there for after all. If the chat turns to matters that interest the Loyalist occasionally instead of the boss, well that’s just natural isn’t it?
What are bosses for?
Bosses control things – resources, assignments, roles, salaries, promotions – which are desirable. Their purpose is therefore clear: they are there in order to give these desirable things to you rather than wasting them on someone else. Naturally this doesn’t just happen. They need to be farmed, like milk-cows, or perhaps chickens, so that they lay these desirable things at regular intervals.
Your first task, therefore, is to identify who controls what and whether or not those things are desirable. If you can’t decide what sort of farm to run, you are unlikely to grow anything successfully.
Consider “promotion” as an example. Promotions come in two kinds. The first type involves being advanced from grade 23 to grade 24 with commensurate salary rise, with no appreciable change in required level of work or responsibility. “Congratulations to the Man in the Moon on his promotion to Senior Man in the Moon”. The second involves real additional duties, responsibility and/or power: “The Man in the Moon has been promoted to Our Man in Havana”. Quite often separate mechanisms exist for determining how these are acquired. The former is frequently the decision of your line manager alone, the second by committee.
“All promotions are determined by application and interview in my organisation,” you cry. Rubbish. No one ever advertised a position in that way without having already decided, or at least short-listed, who is going to get the job in advance. Even if the process appears to be fair, the job specification, minimum qualities required, or whatever, will have been biased in advance towards the preferred individual. How could the advert have been written unless the boss in question had visualised his/her “ideal applicant” beforehand? Nobody can visualise their “ideal applicant” without picturing one individual, or at most two or three stirred-together. These will of course be the desired short-list.
You cannot get ahead of this particular game unless you know how the system works. Firstly you need to decide which kind of promotion it is that you would prefer. Secondly you need to know how they are conferred. For example if it is by committee: who sits on the committee; what are their likely criteria; how is the short-list determined; is there a right of veto? A veto-based process, by the way, is a particularly helpful one to you, because your task is simplified. You need only ensure that your target group of decision-making bosses has no particular reason to veto you personally. Most less discerning candidates, who have not identified their target boss group so carefully, will probably cross one or another of the relevant bosses just by chance along the way.
Here of course your Spy staff have a role of fundamental importance to play (what to do if you don’t have staff is covered in another post). They need to find out what desirable things are likely to come on offer before everyone else finds out and find out on what basis they will be awarded. Having established the ground rules, your job is to get them awarded to you before the real selection process begins. It may still be necessary to go through the motions – many companies have policies in this area – but you should land a sufficiently high percentage in this way to make the effort worthwhile. Don’t be discouraged if you lose more than you win; the point is to have as large a field to play for as possible at all times, and to play with an inside edge, so that your win-rate is suitably great.
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