Trust, Uncertainty, and Being a Great Manager
Being a manager is a constant balancing act. Get too involved and you are a micromanager, not involved enough and you are “conflict averse” or an “absentee manager.” Each person — and person-task combination — needs a different level of involvement, which makes finding the right balance even harder. Getting the correct balance takes constant evaluation and reflection. This post focuses on factors internal to you — the manager.
Disclaimer: This post is meant to spark thought and lead to self-reflection. It should make you uncomfortable. That discomfort is you gaining a bit of perspective.
Let’s start with a scenario. One of the projects being run by your team is late. It is a project related to “machine learning,” you are not an ML expert, and this is the first ML project at your company. The CEO is upset and demands to know when it will be in production. What is your gut reaction? Reflect on this a moment by thinking about a similar scenario from real life — we have all had them.
Do you immediately take control of the project and get it back on schedule? Do you become an ML expert and dig into the project? Do you blame the team responsible for implementing ML? Do you replace the manager/tech-lead? Do you get the whole team into a room and get answers? Do you try to understand how the team made the estimates, and what has deviated from assumptions?
How you choose to manage uncertainty determines your response to the above questions. Did you try to reduce uncertainty through direct control and knowing every detail? Did you try to reduce uncertainty by letting the team sort it out and hoping for the best? Did you try to help the teams, but avoid ruffling anyone’s feathers? Did you work with the team to identify issues and then mentor the team?
Uncertainty is unavoidable in software projects. Learning how to trust, empower, and support employees helps manage uncertainty by improving your awareness. The key is learning how to mitigate risks and uncertainty by supporting your employees, and not controlling or abandoning them.
Next we will explore some common tendencies, and the impact they have on your teams. We will finish with a discussion of a few aspects of good leaders.
Common Management Tendencies
Micromanagers
Micromanagers try to manage uncertainty by directly controlling as much as possible. Employees will perceive the lack of trust, even if it is just the result of the manager feeling uncertain or insecure, and the environment will start to feel unsafe. The lack of trust and safety results in employees being unwilling to try new ideas or take chances, and often earns you a lack of loyalty.
An even more serious impact of the unsafe environment is employes being unwilling to voice concerns. That means the manager may not be aware when things are going wrong until the situation is dire. This leads to last-minute disaster situations like our example occurring more often as your level of responsibility grows.
All managers occasionally struggle with an urge to jump in too deep. When we witness a situation unfolding and we are concerned — or maybe even know — an employee (or team) is going to make the wrong call, it is hard not to jump in and “save” them. The key is asking: will this mistake result in irreparable damage? If so, jump in! However, if it is not a critical mistake, jumping in might produce a very marginal, short term gain at the expense of their learning and growth. Instead offer thoughts and guidance, but allow them to make the final call. The side benefit is that they might actually know more than you do about something and you will get a pleasant surprise.
Absentee Managers
Absentee managers refuse to address risks and uncertainty. They “manage” risks by effectively ignoring them and hoping they do not materialize or that they are incidentally mitigated. Employees might feel initially trusted and empowered, but over time they will feel unsupported, because they are unsupported.
This is a very different situation from active, intentional delegation. Delegation helps employees develop and grow, and it builds mutual trust and respect. Delegation requires explicit, clear communication to set expectations, the level of authority, and the level of accountability the delegatee will have. With delegation, both parties understand what is happening and the ground rules.
Absenteeism occurs when employees voice concerns and ask for help, but their concerns are not acknowledged and no follow-up actions are taken. This isn’t empowerment; it is abandonment. We do not always take actions based on concerns, but we should note them and watch for patterns. Sometimes the best way to help an employee is letting them work through a problem, but some problems will require your involvement.
The effects of absentee management are more dangerous than micromanagement. Employees will think they have made you aware of their risks and concerns, but over time problems and risks are accumulating without being mitigated. Suddenly, the hidden risks begin to materialize and the CEO is wondering why something that was running so well has suddenly failed without warning.
Conflict Aversion
Conflict aversion is like a multiplier — it makes everything worse. Conflict averse workplaces appear outwardly polite, safe, and calm. They appear calm because disagreement and misalignment are left unaddressed… until they blow up. No one knows when a blow up will occur, and in many cases it may be unclear why a blow up is occurring. The result is uncertainty and frustration at all levels.
Conflict averse leaders appear erratic to their subordinates. Only once an issue can no longer be ignored, will they confront it — and they will behave unpredictably. Suddenly they might care a lot about an issue previously on no one’s radar. An employee who thought they were doing well might unexpectedly be harshly questioned or receive negative feedback. These managers struggle to help employees work through problems, and struggle to be radically candid with their employees.
Conflict aversion cultivates a lack of mutual trust and respect. By not addressing issues in a calm, clear, and direct way, employees feel as though they are not respected. They know you might be displeased, but will not say anything until the situation is dangerously bad. Techniques such as non-violent communication can facilitate safe, direct discussions and solicit feedback.
When there are larger decisions and disagreements, conflict aversion is particularly dangerous. There is a tendency to work towards individual agreement in private. It is important to address these decisions openly, not behind the scenes, so there is general agreement and understanding. The worst outcome is everyone individually thinking there is consensus around their opinion, but none of their views aligning.
Being a Good Leader
As a leader, your job is building and developing teams and ensuring they operate at the highest levels. Feeling trusted is a key aspect to employees feeling safe, which is key to high performance teams. Creating a culture with direct, open communication will help minimize speculation and avoid the dangers of grey space. We will now walk through a few skills that help achieve these goals, and keep you from getting surprised by a failed project.
Predictability
Balance, stability, and predictability are crucial for leaders. Employees should be able to reliably predict a manager’s reaction. As a manager, being calm and collected is one of your most valuable skills. If everyone knows what to expect, they will feel safer voicing concerns because they can prepare themselves for your reaction. It is especially important to be calm and stable in group settings, you do not want your emotional outburst to be the subject of coffeepot conversation.
More importantly, your employees will not be surprised when you give them feedback. This is especially important with critical feedback meant to help them grow and develop. If you have ever let someone go and they were surprised, then you are probably not giving enough direct feedback to your employees.
If you are a micromanager, you are probably sensitive to criticism, since every idea was yours. If you tend to be an absentee manager or conflict averse, you will be unpredictable since you struggle with direct communication.
Setting the Example
Everyone is looking to you for the example, they will mimic and follow your response and behavior. Set the examples you want to see emulated! Telling people to behave differently than you behave rarely works. If you want your employees to invest in developing and improving their skills, improve your skills as well. If you want to improve creativity and productivity by ensuring good work-life balance, you should make sure you are balanced.
Employees will also follow your emotional responses. Luckily, positive emotions and reactions get amplified too. Being stable and predictable, does not mean managers should hide all of their emotions or excitement — most emotions have a time and place. The key is to be attentive of how the employees are reacting to your reactions. Techniques such as mindfulness can be especially helpful.
If you are a micromanager, you will struggle to get creative, innovative input. If you are an absentee manager, getting consistent, passionate engagement will be hard. Passive aggressive managers will struggle to get open, critical feedback — especially around risks to a project.
Staying in Touch
Scheduled one-on-one meetings are crucial for monitoring the health of your whole organization. These cannot be done on an ad hoc basis, and they cannot be done only when a report requests them. Most people will wait until something is a serious issue before setting up a meeting to discuss it — by the time a situation is bad enough someone is bringing it up, it has gone too far.
Have regularly scheduled meetings that are treated as a high priority. Allocating dedicated time to someone signals that your reports are valuable and important to you. If you consistently miss 1:1 meetings, or do not pay attention in them, you are sending a clear signal that they are not a priority. These meetings are not status updates — though often the progress or lack thereof will be discussed. Instead, they are conversations that help develop relationships and an understanding of each employee. This is a great way to learn about career aspirations, interests, and their frustrations. Often frustrations will be mentioned in passing, but by having 1:1 meetings with the correct set of people, you will develop a clear picture of your organization. Do many people share similar concerns, or does only one person have particular concern?
One-on-one meetings are your best tool for not being surprised by struggling projects. If you keep them open and safe, you ask good questions, and you listen more than you speak, you will get a wealth of insight.
If you are a micromanager, listening and collecting good, insightful feedback will be hard; your 1:1 meetings will probably be individual status updates. If you are an absentee manager, you might have good 1:1 meetings, but rarely take away action items. If you are conflict averse, you will seldom hear about concerns or frustrations.
Great Leaders
Great managers build teams they can trust to execute. If you do not trust your team, you need to ask why. Do you have the wrong people, are you just not comfortable giving up control, or have you failed to set clear expectations? Great leaders are skilled at building and empowering teams they can trust, and rarely surprise them with undesirable outcomes.
You should measure results, ideally using objective data in conjunction with your “intuition.” Your job is to help employees and teams who are struggling, and give increased responsibility to those who are consistently delivering. Work to eliminate subjectivity by using tools like OKRs. They will give you an objective system to work within and guide your coaching efforts.
Leaders who learn how to manage uncertainty strike a delicate balance, but they are able to deliver results and improve their teams. Their employees feel empowered and trusted. They spend time developing their employees, resulting in higher functioning teams and consistent performance.
Great leaders serve to protect their people. That means they must guide people and give critical feedback. A leader’s role is to help protect the group. If a leader violates their group’s trust, the group will feel unsafe. This breach of trust is hard to recover from — trust must be earned every day.
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