Chapter 9: Of Bosses and Subordinates

Overview

When [the best leaders ] are finished with their work, people say, It happened naturally.
” Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

Everyone who works is either a boss or an underling, and most people are both. Only the person at the very top is not a subordi- nate, and only those at the very bottom don t have people they manage. The manager-subordinate relationship is perhaps the most fundamental dynamic in the workplace and part of the subtext of almost everything that happens between people on the job. In some situations, it plays a leading, obvious role; in others, it s only in the background. But it is always there, directly and indirectly influencing events and shaping behavior. Whether you manage or are managed by Americans, or even if you are personally outside the chain of command but work with people on the inside, understanding the mutual expectations and assumptions of bosses and subordinates in the United States is essential for success. If you don t understand how the manager/subordinate dynamic plays out in the American workplace, you will probably feel like a geologist who doesn t understand plate tectonics.

There are many bosses out there: good ones and bad ones, secure and insecure ones, bosses with a light touch and bosses with a heavy hand. And all kinds of subordinates: ones who do best when they re left alone, ones who must never be left alone, and ones you wish you could leave alone. Needless to say, no two subordinates interact with their bosses in quite the same way, and vice versa, so the standard warning about generalizations is very much in effect in this chapter. Nevertheless, there does seem to be a core of common American traits that define the managersubordinate dynamic, and these will be the focus here.

Power

To start to understand how bosses and subordinates interact in America, we need to address the whole question of power. Americans are deeply conflicted about power: they crave it, but they are loathe to be caught craving it; they say power doesn t matter, but they envy and admire those who have it; those who have power say it s a curse and a burden but fight to the death to keep it and get more of it. Nor do Americans have any qualms about exercising power; they can be quite ruthless , in fact, especially when compared with managers from many Asian and northern European countries. The irony is that while American managers are probably more ambivalent about having power than managers in most other countries , they are also among the most likely to wield it.

Power is one of the last dirty words, writes Rosabeth Moss Kanter, one of the leading management gurus in the United States. It is easier to talk about money ” and much easier to talk about sex ” than it is to talk about power. People who have it deny it; people who want it do not want to appear to hunger for it; and people who engage in its machinations do so secretly (1997, 135).

Why all this coyness? Why can t Americans be more up front about how they feel about power? The reason, in a nutshell , is that at its core the exercise of power involves inequality, and as we ve already seen in these pages, inequality is a very sticky subject for Americans. In any workplace, in any undertaking in which people act together for a common purpose, someone has to give instructions and someone has to carry them out; some people have to be subordinate to the authority and will of other people. This is true in all cultures, of course; what is different is the degree to which people in various cultures are comfortable with the fact that some people must have more power and influence than others.

Americans are not especially comfortable with this fact because of the premium they place on egalitarianism. Not surprisingly, when circumstances oblige Americans to behave in an unequal manner, to act as if they are superior to other people ” as a manager must on occasion ” this behavior doesn t feel quite right. In many ways, the exercise of power obliges Americans to forswear one of their deepest cultural values.

In egalitarian American culture, Gilles Asselin and Ruth Mastron have observed ,

[c]ompanies talk of the participative workplace where employees are empowered to control their own jobs and destinies. The idea of having power over someone, or, worse yet, being under someone s power, makes most Americans vaguely uncomfortable. . . . In France and other Latin cultures, power is acknowledged and spoken of openly. High-level people use their power freely , usually to their own advantage, and are respectfully deferred to by those they control. (2001, 200)

The exercise of authority also conflicts with another deeply held American value, individualism , and further complicates the managersubordinate relationship. Simply stated, independent, self-reliant Americans don t like to be subordinate ” to anyone ” and generally resent being told what to do. No wonder power is such a dirty word.

Bosses, American Style

Their decidedly ambiguous attitude toward power explains the great awkwardness with which many Americans embrace the role of manager, and that same awkwardness pervades the American style of management. By and large, Americans don t like to manage ” or to be managed ” and much about the American workplace is set up precisely to keep the genie (i.e., power) in the bottle , set up, in short, so that workers never have to witness the ugly spectacle of bosses throwing their weight around. When a boss does have to throw his or her weight around, then something has gone terribly wrong. In the United States, the best managers are those who manage least.

Less Is More

One of the most common ways bosses avoid having to exercise authority is to give most of it away to their subordinates. Relative to many cultures, American bosses typically delegate a great deal of responsibility to those under them, empowering them to make their own decisions and trusting them to run their own show. By and large, bosses who do not delegate, the dreaded micromanagers, are not admired. Bosses further abdicate their power by encouraging employees to take initiative and by rewarding them when they do. Bosses always like to be kept informed, of course, to know in general (though usually not in particular) what s going on, but they don t feel they need to manage everything that s going on.

Delegating responsibility and encouraging employees to take initiative are of a piece with another bedrock theme of American culture: the habit of judging oneself and others by achievements. If employees are free to make decisions and solve problems without management interference, then any results they get are their own. By wielding their authority lightly, American managers not only avoid the charge of being autocratic, they also enable employees to freely pursue their single greatest source of satisfaction and self-respect: their achievements. This in turn not only boosts employee morale and performance, it also makes management look good; managers are judged by their achievements, too, don t forget, and foremost among those is the output of their employees.

Build an empowered environment, Ken Langdon and Christina Osborne have observed, in what is standard American management advice,

by encouraging your team members to be less dependent on you as their manager. By delegating responsibility to team members you increase their control over what is achieved [and] . . . the team members are then able to work on their own . . . using their initiative to solve any problems along the way. This will increase their effectiveness and save you time. Stress that you would prefer people to come to you with solutions rather than problems. (2001, 14)

Because bosses do tend to delegate, it s not necessary to always check with a boss before approaching his or her subordinate about a matter that has been delegated to that individual; and it is likewise acceptable in most cases for that person to give you a decision (especially a routine decision) without first checking with the boss. Bosses do like to be kept informed of any important decisions subordinates make, but if the matter in question has been delegated, they would not necessarily expect to be consulted about it.

The habit of delegating helps explain the characteristic American attitude toward making mistakes on the job. For the most part mistakes are expected ” and forgiven. If bosses are going to delegate authority, then they can t very well complain when employees use it. Empowering people doesn t just mean empowering them to do well; it also means empowering them to screw up. Employees should learn from their mistakes, of course, and not repeat them, but they should not be intimidated out of making them. At the same time, when subordinates accept authority they have to accept the consequences. If they do make mistakes, they are expected to admit them and not try to shift the blame.

Listen to a Jordanian banker comparing his experiences working at Western banks and at Arab banks. Autonomy at the [Western] bank was very strong, he notes,

At the moment you join the bank they make you feel that you are important, that you are able to make decisions, that you should not fear making decisions . . . and if you make a mistake, but not serious, they try to help you. From the first moment they let you feel that you are a responsible person . . . who supposes to lead, not to be led. At Arab banks it is the other way around; you do not do anything without referring to the boss, even as a manager, even if you are senior. It is highly centralized, autonomy is very minimal and they [senior top-level management] do not give you the benefit of having confidence, and if you make a mistake, it is against you. (Hickson and Pugh 1995, 197)

Two other practices that keep the power genie in the bottle are the use of specific and very detailed job descriptions and the profusion of procedures manuals. Job descriptions that spell out everyone s duties and responsibilities at considerable length make it unnecessary for bosses to have to step in and tell people what to do. Similarly, if bosses aren t actually going to run the workplace, if it is in effect supposed to run itself, then some systems are needed to make this possible. Hence, the profusion of procedures and operations manuals that explain in great detail how things are supposed to be done.

Finally, most American bosses leave their doors open at all times so that in the unlikely event that they are actually needed for something, employees can have instant access. Indeed, so far as subordinates are concerned , this is the main job of a manager in the United States: to be available. While employees definitely expect and prefer hands-off management, they also want the option of hands-on whenever they need it.

Command and Control

That s how it s all supposed to work anyway ” it s what all the management books say, and it s certainly how most subordinates hope it will work ” but it s not always what happens. For every hands-off, empowering manager, there s a manager who can t quite get the hang of delegating, who wants to know everything that s going on, and who breaks into a sweat whenever he or she hears the word initiative. But how can this be? Didn t these people get the message ” the message that says people do their best work when you leave them alone?

They probably did get the message, but the fact is that American culture sends its managers mixed messages, and some managers handle the inevitable confusion much better than others. The management and leadership books may indeed say to delegate and empower , but senior management and stockholders tend to be much more interested in the bottom line, in results (usually spelled profits ). In the final analysis, everyone, including the boss, has to produce; in fact, the boss in particular has to produce and is held more accountable for the bottom line than anyone else.

Understandably, this makes some bosses jumpy. All other things being equal, they would probably be quite happy to manage with a light touch, staying out of the way and letting people get on with their jobs. But all other things are frequently not equal, and middle managers typically come under considerable pressure to cut costs, improve performance, meet ever-higher quotas (usually with fewer people), increase market share, and otherwise grow the business. Some bosses handle this pressure quite well, probably because they have some first-rate subordinates (see Subordinates, American Style, pages 136 “39) and because their managers are very supportive; whatever the reason, these bosses manage to be hands-off and still get maximum performance, hence stellar results, out of their people.

But other managers, who either aren t so lucky in their workers or their bosses, aren t so sure of themselves , or may simply be driven ” manage with a vengeance, keeping a tight rein on subordinates, making most of the decisions, and sweating most of the details. It has been called the command and control style of management, and it is probably at least as common in the American workplace as the hands-off style everyone claims they practice.

In truth most managers probably move back and forth between the hands-off and command and control styles, depending on the nature of the particular task or function in question and the employees who are being managed. Even the most empowering of managers have to take control from time to time, and the most autocratic bosses have to delegate some tasks . There is, in short, an inherent tension in being a good manager in the United States, the result, at least in part, of competing cultural values that cannot always be reconciled. Exercise authority, Robert Heller writes in a typically schizophrenic piece of American management advice, but not unnecessary force, to achieve desired results. Sharing authority helps develop people s own talents. . . . Look also for whole areas that can be delegated, but always retain overall control. (1998, 53)

Finding the right balance between giving up power and staying in control can be stressful, which is probably why managers are more prone to nervous breakdowns than those who work under them. But at least they get paid more.

Informality

Non-Americans may also be fooled into thinking Americans are more laid back about power than they really are by the air of informality that characterizes manager-subordinate relations. American managers typically cultivate a low profile, going out of their way to act like ” and to insist on being treated as ” just another member of the team. If the worst thing anyone can do in the United States is to act superior, then people who are in a superior position have to be especially careful to act humble , hence the practice of everyone calling everyone else by their first name , bosses leaving their doors open, and managers making their own coffee. When an American, Tom Glocer, took over the venerable British media group Reuters, he made a few very American changes. I like seeing the people I work with, he explained.

So I tore down a bunch of walls [and] asked that my management team do the same, and we put up glass. I wouldn t say it has the buzz of a news- room or a trading floor, but it is not the mahogany panel, please -book- with-the-secretary before you come in [look]. It is, Oh, I see you are in, can I show you what I am working on? Which is more my style, I guess. (Goldsmith and Deogun 2003, B11)

Bosses are informal with their subordinates in the United States, but the meaning is not that everyone is equal; it is, rather, that bosses should wear their power lightly and not act as if they deserve special treatment or should be deferred to because of their elevated status. Bosses should be especially careful never to act as if they re above doing certain things, especially certain menial tasks. I didn t see myself as a boss, observes Jack Welch, former CEO of General Electric, about one of his first management positions , but as a peer. We didn t have any pomp and circumstance. . . . I think ideally that is how a company works. It becomes a place of ideas, not a place of position ( The Wall Street Journal, Boss Talk, 2002, 4).

The irony is that so long as a boss behaves as if he or she is just like everyone else, then that boss will in fact get special treatment and be deferred to. Subordinates are always on the lookout for signs that becoming a boss has gone to [someone s] head or that the person has forgotten where he came from (that is, down here with the rest of us). Don t worry though; bosses who momentarily forget where they came from will soon be reminded that they too put their trousers on one leg at a time.

Confused? Don t be. It s really quite easy: to be a good boss in the United States, just remember never to act like a boss.

Managers, Not Experts

Unlike some cultures, bosses in the United States are not expected to be subject-matter or technical experts in the areas in which they work. While many managers are experts, having worked their way up through the ranks in a particular division, technical discipline, or product line, many bosses are hired primarily for their managerial expertise or their people skills. The head of finance may not know anything about finance, but he or she may have good leadership skills or be good at down-sizing or at reinvigorating a low-performing division. It s not uncommon, therefore, for bosses to know less about a particular subject or be less adept in a particular skill than the people who work under them. Nor is it embarrassing for a boss to be unable to answer technical questions or be unable to perform a common task.

American managers do not necessarily have all the answers, two observers have noted,

and their subordinates do not expect them to. Coaching and developing one s team are important management responsibilities, and most managers would have no problem admitting that a subordinate is better informed in a certain area. . . . Such an admission from a French top-level manager would be the equivalent of giving the order to drop the guillotine blade . . . . [French] subordinates expect [their managers] to know everything and to have all the answers. Confessing one s ignorance is usually perceived to be a sign of weakness. (Asselin and Mastron 2001, 219)

In a multi-country survey, the French management specialist Andre Laurent asked people whether or not they agreed with the following statement: It is important for a manager to have at hand precise answers to most of the questions that subordinates may raise about their work. While two- thirds of the Italian and 53 percent of the French respondents agreed, less than 18 percent of the Americans did (Hampden-Turner and Trompenaars 1993, 357).

Decision Making

By and large, decision making is not a consultative nor an especially participatory process in the United States, certainly not when compared with Western Europe and much of the Asia-Pacific region. Managers may feel the need to get input, as they call it, to solicit opinions and ideas, but they do not feel compelled to build a consensus for a decision or to involve subordinates in any substantive way in their deliberations. Consensus building takes time, for one thing, and Americans want and expect things to happen fast. Americans may lose patience with the participative, committee cultures of some countries, John Mole has written. They do not look for consensus, in the sense of collective responsibility for a decision jointly arrived at, but for wholehearted commitment to a course of action for which one person carries total responsibility (2003, 263).

Nothing slows down the pace of work more than bosses who can t make decisions, which is why being decisive ” by which Americans mean getting minimal input and acting quickly ” is one of the principal criteria by which managers are judged in the United States. In some contexts, a quick decision is almost as good as the right one. In his introduction to Boss Talk, a series of interviews with top executives, leadership guru Tom Peters advises managers to just get on with it when it comes to making decisions. Don t wobble. . . . [M]aking a decision and moving forward and seeing what happens, even if it s messy, is far better than endless debate . . . ( The Wall Street Journal, 2002, xii).

For the most part, decision making American style is also consistent with the less-is-more, empowering approach to management described above. If delegating means anything, it means delegating the authority to make one s own decisions, and this is a general norm in the workplace. Subordinates don t like to be second-guessed, as they call it, to have their decisions questioned or reviewed by management, so long, of course, as the matter decided is within the employee s area of responsibility. At the same time, workers are expected to take full responsibility for the decisions they make.

The same holds true for bosses, who are also free to make their own decisions about the areas they are responsible for. Many of these decisions affect employees, of course, and while bosses are expected to consult employees about significant matters, they generally don t feel the need to build a consensus for their decisions. Just as managers are expected to trust the decisions subordinates make, so too subordinates are expected to trust bosses in the decisions they make.

Leadership

What is a manager s job, then, if it s not to supervise employees? Judging from all the books on the subject, a manager s primary job is to lead. While no one s quite sure what this means ” the books breathlessly urge leading from the top, from the bottom, from out in front, from behind, from within ” there is basic agreement on two main points: (1) a leader articulates the general direction of the office or division, its primary mission or role, and, perhaps most important, (2) a leader coaches and encourages his or her employees. You need to engage people in where it is you re going in a serious way, Steve Ballmer of Microsoft explains about defining the direction, and have them really feel it and be enthused by it. They need a mission ( The Wall Street Journal, Boss Talk 15).

While employees generally want to be left alone, they do appreciate and expect encouragement from the manager. They like to be told that they re doing a good job, to be praised for individual accomplishments, to be recognized for their contributions ” and the more often the better. Americans in general are very free with praise, and managers are no exception. The other way managers encourage subordinates is by giving them all the support they need to do their work. Subordinates don t expect to be told how to do their jobs, but they do expect to be given the resources they need to perform, such as technology, training, administrative and logistical support, even some general guidance from above. Workers are ultimately judged by results, after all, by their output, and it s a manager s responsibility to his or her employees to provide them with the tools and the overall work environment they need to maximize their output.

In this context it should be noted that all that has been said about power notwithstanding, American subordinates actually do want their bosses to have power; they just don t want it used on them. They want their bosses to be respected and influential in the company or organization, and especially to have what is known as clout, the ability to get the attention of senior management and persuade them to do their bidding.

Subordinates expect their bosses to look out for them and get the support that s needed for the division. The unspoken contract between boss and subordinate is something like this: I ll do my job (i.e., by myself, without help) and you ll do yours. Bosses should be seen but not heard around the office, perhaps, but they should be seen and heard everywhere else.

Relationship with Subordinates

Bosses must be very careful not to have favorites, to make exceptions for certain employees, for example, and not others, to be seen to protect or make excuses for certain people, or to judge different employees by different standards. Managers are only human, of course, and like all humans they have more in common or get along better with some people than with others, but they should never act that way in the workplace. Next to behaving as if they are superior, which is the worst thing a boss can do, treating certain employees better than others is the second worst. Playing favorites violates that most basic of American values, egalitarianism, and is one of the quickest ways to undermine morale and performance in the workplace.

Bosses usually keep their distance from the personal lives of their employees. While subordinates often befriend and socialize with each other (see Workplace Relationships, pages 146 “48), it is much less common for a boss and one of his or her subordinates to become personal friends . If this does happen, both of them must be very careful not to bring their friendship into the workplace, which would be considered extremely un- professional. In some cultures bosses play a parental role vis-  -vis their employees, assuming a certain amount of responsibility for the overall well-being of those who work under them, both on and off the job. This father-figure function is not part of the manager-subordinate relation- ship in the United States.

Subordinates, American Style

If the expectation of bosses is that they will be hands-off, then the expectation of subordinates is that they will be able to handle all the freedom.

Employees who are not going to be managed, in short, had better be able to manage themselves. And the qualities that make that possible ” being self-reliant, creative, proactive, a problem solver, able to take responsibility, and, above all, being a self-starter, someone who does not need a great deal of supervision and support ” are the qualities that are most admired and rewarded in the American workplace.

By contrast, the worst thing a worker can be in the United States is needy or what is sometimes known as an HME, a high maintenance employee. HMEs, as the name suggests, are those individuals who more or less turn the ideal manager-subordinate relationship on its head, needing very close supervision and a great deal of support. HMEs are so concerned about making mistakes or being blamed for something, Stephen Viscusi writes in On the Job,

that they re incapable of showing initiative, applying creativity, or working things out with other employees on their own. The manager is constantly drawn in to every deliberation, asked for guidance on every step, no matter how trivial. Delegating to an HME increases a manager s workload, rather than decreases it. (2001, 42, 43)

As Viscusi suggests, bosses expect employees to get along with each other. Subordinates are supposed to be professionals, and that means they should be able to set aside personal feelings and differences of opinion and work together to get the job done. Of all the tasks hands-off bosses want to keep their hands off of, surely dealing with interpersonal conflicts is at the top of the list.

Taking Initiative

Subordinates who are given responsibility are expected to exercise it, to think for themselves, make decisions, take risks, and not be afraid to make or admit to mistakes. In their book If it ain t broken, break it, Robert Kriegel and Louis Patler tell the story of Jim Burke, a director at the American pharmaceutical company Johnson and Johnson, one of whose

first stabs at innovation, upon becoming head of the new products division, was a children s chest rub. It failed miserably, and Burke worried that he might not get a second chance. Are you the one who just cost us all that money? asked J&J chairman General Robert Wood Johnson. Well, I just want to congratulate you. If you are making mistakes, that means you are making decisions and taking risks, and we won t grow unless you take risks. (1991, 197)

Speaking Up

Subordinates are expected to form their own opinions (not simply repeat those of the boss) and express themselves freely. If the practice of delegating is going to work, then bosses need honest assessments of those matters that have been delegated and about which subordinates, after all, know much more than their superiors. This is especially true in those cases where the subordinate s view or assessment of a situation or a practice may differ from that of the boss. If a subordinate disagrees with the boss, thinks the boss is wrong, or hasn t understood something, he or she is expected to say so, albeit tactfully and at the right moment. Bosses are always free to disregard what subordinates say in such situations ” supervisors always have the final say ” but subordinates are expected to express any reservations , concerns, or differing opinions. In the end, bosses can only make good decisions if they have good information, but if subordinates pull their punches in their interactions with superiors, then bosses may never get the information they need. Associates who do not concur with the decisions being made during meetings have a responsibility to speak up, Perry Smith has written. By remaining silent during these discussions, they do the leader a grave disservice. A major part of the associates duties is to speak out on issues, particularly when they disagree . . . (2002, 37).

It s true, of course, that insecure or weak bosses may prefer subordinates who tell them what they want to hear and who never disagree with them, but the best bosses want the truth and tend not to take disagreements personally. These bosses usually have a nose for people who are trying to curry favor with them and tend to keep them at a safe distance. Coworkers, meanwhile, look down on colleagues who suck up to managers by always agreeing with them.

All of the above notwithstanding, subordinates should still be careful how they go about disagreeing with a boss or telling her she s wrong.

Bosses have feelings too, and it is no more appropriate to hurt a supervisor s feelings than it is to hurt anyone else s. A meeting or any other public venue is almost never the right place to disagree with a boss. And even when you are in the right place, remember that your goal is not so much to point out that the boss is wrong as it is to provide the right information (and let the boss figure out the rest).

How Americans See Others

In many cultures power is not such a dirty word. In his famous study of IBM mentioned earlier, the Dutch sociologist Geert Hofstede distinguished between what he called low- and high- power distance cultures, depending on how comfortable people in a given culture were with the unequal distribution of power and influence that is common to all societies . In high-power-distance cultures, people accept inequality in power and influence quite readily; bosses closely guard their power and rarely delegate (although authority is often delegated on paper), and subordinates expect and want to be micromanaged. As you might imagine, the United States ranked low on power distance in Hofstede s survey: number 38 out of 50 countries or in the bottom fourth (1991, 26).

Empowered American subordinates do not take kindly to high- power-distance bosses who closely guard their authority. They come across as power hungry, aloof, and dominating, and accordingly they inspire little or no respect (although, ironically, they seem to crave it). They can also come across as insecure and easily threatened; they don t share information, for example, or encourage open communication up and down the ranks. Such bosses get upset when an American disagrees with them, and they don t like it when someone goes to a subordinate for a decision, tries to use his or her own judgment or initiative, or doesn t keep the boss informed of the most minor matters.

Since these high-power-distance bosses tend to micromanage and not delegate, Americans conclude that either they don t trust their subordinates or they don t think much of their abilities . Either way, their meddling and second-guessing undermine morale and motivation and stifle creativity. If these managers also seem to expect special treatment, to be deferred to, for example, or be called by their title, or if they act as if they re above doing certain things, then they run the additional risk of coming across as arrogant and egotistical.

Meanwhile, Americans tend to see the subordinates in these cultures as browbeaten, timid, and lacking in self-confidence . They say whatever their bosses want to hear, are obsessed with being polite and respectful, and refuse to take any responsibility. Americans who manage such subordinates are frustrated and annoyed by their apparent lack of initiative, by their need for constant supervision and guidance, by their apparent paranoia about making mistakes, and by their unwillingness to take even the most routine actions without first checking with the boss.

Americans think subordinates from high-power-distance cultures can t be entirely trusted. They don t ask questions when they should, don t speak up when they haven t understood or don t agree with something, and don t ask for help when they need it. When they are confronted with a mistake, they have the temerity to blame the manager for not giving better instructions or closer supervision. Their behavior is altogether too passive and sycophantic for the typical American boss.

American bosses get frustrated when high-power-distance types come to them for decisions about matters that are decided further down the chain of command, usually by middle managers. The people who approach these bosses believe they are being polite and respectful, of course, but to the Americans, who really do delegate down, it s a waste of time to have to hear these people out and then send them to the real decision makers .

Americans are also very frustrated by bosses from more particularist cultures where people take very good care of their ingroup. These bosses tend to give ingroup members preferential treatment and to reward loyalty much more highly than performance. Americans find these bosses unfair and feel undervalued when their achievements don t seem to count for anything.

Quick Tips: Advice for Working with Americans

Managers

• Don t act superior :

  • “ don t insist on deference or formality from your employees.

    “ be accessible, available to talk with subordinates whenever they need to see you.

    “ never act as if you re above (too important to do) certain menial tasks.

• Don t be upset if employees disagree with you or give you their input ; they re not being disrespectful.

• Don t be afraid to delegate authority and responsibility; hoarding your power is taken as a sign of weakness and a lack of confidence in subordinates.

• Do not micromanage your employees:

  • “ don t second-guess decisions you have empowered them to make.

  • “ don t expect them to check with you before taking routine actions.

  • “ don t insist on being kept informed about all the details of what they are doing.

  • “ let subordinates try things even if they might fail. “ encourage open discussion and feedback.

  • “ don t become defensive if someone disagrees with you.

Subordinates

• Expect general but not specific guidance from your boss; you will usually be told what to do, but you will be expected to decide how to do it on your own.

• Keep your boss informed of the big picture but not all the details of what you do.

• If something has been delegated to you, you can usually act on that matter without getting permission from your boss.

• It s okay, one-on-one, to question your boss or express disagreement .

• Bosses don t expect you to agree with everything they say; they want ” and need ” your honest feedback (but not in a way that embarrasses them or undermines their authority).

• Don t be too worried about making mistakes; most bosses prefer employees who use initiative and exercise their own judgment.