Ways to ‘manage up’ even from home

from Monica Fike & Gorick Ng

Monica Fike Editor at LinkedIn News suggests:

While the work-from-home marathon continues for many, it’s easy to feel insulated in the home office bubble.

But The New York Times reminds us not to forget about our bosses, and that fostering our relationships with them, or “managing up,” should be a part our daily routine.

Being a strong communicator and knowing their likes and dislikes can vastly “improve your chances at recognition, raises and promotions.”

Here are a few more tricks to managing up effectively:

Be a sleuth and understand the 5 Ws — who, what, why, when where of any project for confirmation and clarity.

• Be proactive and not just reactionary.
• Focus on establishing trust. 
• Try not to burden your boss with any “unnecessary work.” 
• Remember you are part of a team
• Empathetic team members keep a team healthy in ways that a sole focus on excellence does not.

Gorick Ng was in The New York Times with tips on how to “manage up.”

His 3 favourites:

𝟭) 𝗨𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 “𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁,” “𝗵𝗼𝘄,” 𝗮𝗻𝗱 “𝗯𝘆 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗻”: Understand 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 you need to do, 𝘩𝘰𝘸 you need to do it, and 𝘣𝘺 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 you need to do it.

If you don’t clarify, you’ll end up doing the wrong work, doing it the wrong way, or not doing it on time.

𝟮) 𝗢𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗿 𝗮 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗰𝗵𝗲𝗰𝗸 𝗶𝗻: Try saying, “I’ll take a stab at this by Friday and send you an outline for your feedback” or “Can we schedule a short status meeting for next week?”

Don’t do the five-hour task before you know the five-minute version is on the right track.

𝟯) 𝗦𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗱𝘂𝗲 𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗲𝘀: Let your manager know that you need feedback by 5 p.m. Tuesday, for example, so you can send a report out at 5 p.m. Wednesday.

Or that if you don’t hear back by a certain (reasonable) time, you’ll move forward with your plan.