Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Why Employees Dislike Their Managers

Have you ever heard the phrase: “It’s not you, it’s me”?


You are probably familiar with this, but in a different context. Maybe you have heard this phrase at home or at a friend’s house, but usually not in the working environment. If it is quite common at work, then stick to your job. It is probably the best place you could be right now.


What intrigues me is why don’t we like to say this at work? What makes it so damn difficult to admit that one has made a mistake? This especially includes the managers.


There are millions of inspirational quotes and articles about making mistakes and learning from them. And in theory, everything is beautiful and accurate. When it comes to practice, a totally new situation arises. Admitting one’s mistakes gets harder. Eyes start rolling around, legs start shaking, face turns red and a tongue gets lost. Nobody, even the manager, want to admit publicly that they have made a huge mistake by assigning a wrong task, executing a wrong strategy, making a wrong decision.


There are probably many explanations why managers are sometimes disliked and hated. They spy on their employees – but why do they need to do that? They over manage employees – yes, but why? There is a lack of trust in the relationship – why is it so?


According to a Gallup survey of 5 million workers, 52% of employees said they are not engaged in their work. According to a study made by Development Dimensions International, 39% of the employees left their jobs because of their bosses and 55% were thinking about it. Well, these are staggering numbers. Especially, if you consider how simple the process is. Company hires an employee. This employee starts doing the job that he was hired for and then, the manager just does not let him do that. The end result, employee leaves and a replacement is hired.


Sure, this does not reflect the real situation, where you have 100+ more variables. But solving complex situations with complex equations is not the answer either. So, we come to the initial question: why employees dislike their managers? It is all about the communication. And there are no one-way roads in communication, it is a two-way street.


Let’s come back to the earlier questions. Why managers spy on employees? Have employees been always 100% truthful with the manager, have they told everything that needs to be told or do they sometimes hold it back. If the employee really is an example of hard-working citizen, then no sane manager will waste their time to spy on him. But if there is a communication hole, then there might be a reason for the action.


Why managers over manage employees? Is the manager told that this is the scenario? Again, everything boils down to communication. If the manager is aware of the tasks, there is no need to over manage. Time is a valuable asset and time is the only resource that does not reproduce itself. Everyone has only 86400 seconds in their day and not a second more. So there is no time to over do anything. If the communication flows and everybody are up-to-date with current tasks, then there is no need to over manage as well.


There are so many other questions that could be asked and analyzed. But they all come down to the core reason – communication. Stop wondering what the manager might or might not want, stop wondering what the employee might or might not do. Be aware of the three P-s: what are the Plans, Progresses and Problems the other party is facing. Just communicate, online or offline, using e-mail, online tools like Weekdone or just talking, whatever works for you.


Source: B2C_Business



Why Employees Dislike Their Managers

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