5 Things No One Tells You About Being a Manager

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5 years ago

Like many of Mrs. Type A readers, you are likely pursuing a professional career focused on obtaining and thriving in a management position. You’ve worked hard for many years and have made substantial contributions to your company. Now it’s time to get promoted to management!! As you continue on this path, it’s important to know that the job of being a manager is often the most misunderstood role in an organization.

To help you prepare for a management position (or succeed in one if you’ve been promoted), here are some things to be aware of about being a manager

5 Things No One Tells You About Being a Manager

1. Being a manager is different than being a high performing individual contributor

To be a great individual contributor, your role is to deliver work. You need to have technical skills, an ability to see work through, and work well with key stakeholders in order to get things done.

On the other hand, a manager’s job is to ensure the ecosystem around his or her direct reports is supportive of them to deliver their work. So, they grapple with questions such as:

Are we doing the right work?

Do we have the right resourcing?

What are the priorities for the next quarter?

Do my direct reports need to build different skills?

How should the focus of the team look different next year?

Who needs to know about what my team is doing?”

Are my team members happy?

What do my direct reports want to do next with their careers?

Honestly, there are hundreds of other questions, but hopefully that gives you the sense of how different the thoughts and worries are as a manager vs. an individual contributor.

To answer these questions, you need less technical skills and more strategic thinking, long-term planning, budgeting, communication, and inspiration skills.

For this reason, many (or, probably, most) first time managers get into trouble during their first year. They focus on what they know (the work) vs. what they need to do to pave the way to get work done.

It helps to have a formal management education, such as an MBA, where you can study some of the key topics. That said, it takes mostly first hand experience (just like reading a parenting book won’t make you the perfect parent…you need experience).

I don’t mean to imply that strong individual contributors cannot be great managers. Rather, that they need to pivot their focus in order to continue to succeed in their new role.

2. Being a manager is harder than being an individual contributor

At a high level, the manager’s job seems easy: other people do work while you “manage.” It can seem this way because often most of what a manager does is not entirely visible to his or her direct reports (it should be, but that is perhaps a different post on how to grow leaders when you are a manager).

At the core, it’s very hard to inspire people to do the work you want them to do the way you want them to do it. Perhaps in a “command and control” type organization, it’s easier because managers tell employees what to do. However, it’s increasingly a world with companies following a “servant leader” philosophy. In this model, it can be challenging to get aligned with your staff on the priorities and on execution.

In addition, managers often have to deal with really ugly managerial situations, such as:

Downsizing
Coverage for employees on leave
Office space (who gets an office, who sits next to the bathroom)
Under-performing employees
Being named in a lawsuit from a disgruntled employee

In addition to these sticky managerial scenarios, managers also have to deal with their peers.

Why is that difficult?

Well, you’re often competing with your fellow managers for headcount, budget, talent, or special projects. Also, managers are frequently positioning themselves for the next promotion and the tactics can get ugly. It can be like House of Cards.

3. You’re constantly judged by everyone as a manager

As a manager, you are more visible to the organization than, likely, an individual contributor. People will take note of how you dress, what you say, how your career progresses. I was part of a department once and every time the leader spoke to the department, team members sat in the back and texted each other making fun of what he said.

How awful is that?

While that is an extreme example, it illustrates what goes on more frequently, which is that your direct reports and others will be watching what you do and drawing conclusions that are often unfair. You also are visible to leaders across the organization, which will also come to their own uninformed conclusions about you as well.

4. It’s lonely

Have you ever heard the phrase, “it’s lonely at the top?”

It’s a common saying for good reason.

Once you are a manager, people often want you to look favorably upon them. So they may not be entirely honest and transparent in giving you thoughts and feedback. Or they may try to hide negative things from you so you don’t find out.

How many times has someone senior asked your opinion on something, which you thought was a bad idea, for you to reply, “looks great!”

As a result, you may not get great support. On top of that, you’re not always free to share information with your team (ie, about re-organizations or performance issues with other teammates) so you’re often left to deal with them alone. It can feel very lonely.

5. You’re happiest when others succeed

As a manager, you’ll invest countless hours into the success and happiness of your direct reports. You’re proud and happy for someone else’s win. Even happier than if it were your own win. It may seem weird but you do thrive on having your team succeed.

It makes it worth it….most of the time :)!

Hopefully, you are aware of the challenges and tough parts of being a manager, before you get your promotion. If you are, imagine how prepared and successful you will be in the role!

Let me know other things no one tells you about being a manager below in the comments!

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