Everyone’s very first experience of management is on the other side of the table, and the experience of being managed is the foundation on which you build your own management philosophy. Unfortunately, I’ve come to see that there are people who have never in their careers had a good manager. Friends of mine talk about their best managers as managing them with “benign neglect.” The engineer just kind of knows what to work on, and the manager just leaves them alone entirely. In the most extreme case, one person reported meeting only twice with his manager in the span of six months, one of those times to receive a promotion.
Benign neglect isn’t so bad when you consider some of the alternatives. There are the neglectful managers who ignore you when you need help and brush your concerns aside, who avoid meeting with you and who never give you feedback, only to tell you suddenly that you are not meeting expectations or not qualified to be promoted. And of course there are micromanagers who question every detail of everything you do and refuse to let you make any decisions on your own. Still worse are actively abusive managers who neglect you until they want to yell at you for something. Sadly, all of these characters are walking around our companies, wreaking havoc on the mental health of their teams. When you believe that these are the only alternatives, a manager who leaves you alone most of the time unless you specifically ask for help doesn’t seem so bad at all.
There are, however, other options. Managers who care about you as a person, and who actively work to help you grow in your career. Managers who teach you important skills and give you valuable feedback. Managers who help you navigate difficult situations, who help you figure out what you need to learn. Managers who want you to take their job someday. And most importantly, managers who help you understand what is important to focus on, and enable you to have that focus.
At a minimum, there are a few tasks that you should expect your manager to perform as needed, in order to keep you and your team on track. As you learn what to expect from your manager, you can start to ask for what you need.