Micromanagers

Work anywhere for long enough, and you’ll eventually run into a micromanager (if you can’t think of one, maybe it’s you.). Micromanagers will show up at your desk all the time, asking for status updates, second guessing every coding decision you make, and even overriding your coding decisions, often in ways that are destructive to long-term productivity. It will quickly drive you nuts and make you want to look for another job. However, before you quit, it can often be worthwhile to see if you can change the way that you interact with your manager. If you do this correctly, your micromanager may turn into your strongest advocate. You already know they are relentless, so it’s worth considering. We should probably define “micromanager” here, because people tend to use that term in a lot of situations where it doesn’t really apply. A micromanager is “a manager who closely observes and controls and or reminds the work of his/her subordinates or employees” (wikipedia). It’s important to note that a micromanager isn’t someone who asks for project updates when you are already behind, pulls you back from gold-plating something, or who reminds you of a critical deadline. A micromanager typically is someone who is overly anxious and controlling, which is reflected in their management style. It’s this understanding that is the most important part, because it gives you a way to counteract the behavior. You are going to eventually deal with a micromanager and emotional, frustration-driven reactions will not make it stop most of the time. Instead, you are going to have to come up with ways to convince a micromanager that you are actually competent and that it is in their best interest to leave you alone. To do this, you have to get outside of your own head and into the mind of your manager. However, like most scenarios where you are trying to understand another person, you will never have a perfect understanding of why your manager is acting this way. Instead, you have to work with incomplete information and attempt to modify your manager’s behavior by changing your own behavior. While this can be time consuming and difficult, it is often worth doing, as reformed micromanagers can become some of your biggest advocates. Regardless, if you have much of a career at all, you will eventually run into a micromanager or two along the way – you might as well have a strategy for dealing with them. Episode Breakdown Reasons People Become Micromanagers Why micromanagement is a problem. Constant reporting of status and watching over your shoulder instead of getting work done. Which leads to more monitoring/mismanagement and watching over your shoulder instead of getting your work done. Completely destroys morale among the team and encourages backstabbing behavior. This rapidly increases turnover. Tends to give the impression that your boss will throw you under the bus to protect them against their own boss. It also wastes management’s time, which is typically more expensive and should be used to help make the team more efficient. How micromanagers are born Oftentimes, it’s because it’s their first job and they don’t know what they are doing. Probably half of all new managers do this at some point. It can also start out of insecurity due to their own position being precarious, or that of the company in general. Management may know about things that you don’t and might be micromanaging in an attempt to protect you. It can also occur because you, someone on your team, or someone at a previous employer of your boss was unreliable and had to be over-managed in order to get them to do their job. This can also a reflect a lack of knowledge on the part of your manager. For instance, if you get a manager who is not familiar with tech and is trying to ma...