Don’t Poke the Lion
Those who poke lions end up bloody.
It was news to me when my boss’s boss said, “I know you guys don’t get along.”
I thought we got along great. She thought I was hard to manage.
Bosses define success.
The difference between disruption and innovation is the boss’s attitude toward change.
You may believe success is coming up with new ideas. But, if your boss doesn’t like waves, you’re a troublemaker.
7 reasons you’re hard to manage:
- Fixing the boss’s shortcomings is your mission in life. You’re helping. In reality, you come off like a jerk.
- Organizational culture is an inconvenience to you. You’re a bull in the china shop when you don’t understand how things get done in your organization, regardless of your intentions.
- There’s one way to do things, yours.
- Drama is your middle name.
- The team comes second. You come first.
- There’s always something wrong.
- Feedback is met with reasons, excuses, or complaints.
7 ways to manage lions:
- Listen to the questions your boss keeps asking. Answer their questions before they ask.
- Solve frustrations, don’t create them. I’ve had teammates who make my life harder and some who make it easier. Guess who earned opportunities.
- Avoid tug-of-war with your boss. Hot emotion reflects their need to control.
- Show compassion. Your boss is dealing with issues you may not understand.
- Remember when you fail, their boss asks them, not you, what happened. (This applies most to organizational cultures where mistakes are failures rather than learning opportunities.)
- Stop whining about things you can’t change. If you’re in a highly regulated industry, accept it or move on.
- Spend most of your time managing your team, not your boss.
Bonus: Give your boss what they want, not what you want.
Leadership is about others. That includes the boss.
What mistakes do people make with the boss?
What “lion-management” tips work for you?
Taking ideas as criticism and not as new, fresh and innovative suggestions to take serious.
Putting your needs first and your organizations’ needs second, which is not the way it should be.
Listening to my bosses needs and questions first and answer them, they must be important otherwise they wouldn’t be raised.
Thanks Dennis. I read the voice of experience in your insights. Thanks
A few years of experience as a leader in the professional field and I am embarking though on a new path next month as a manager within fashion industry. I am gonna work for a UK brand. I enjoy reading your insights and comments about leadership. It’s very clear and to the point + short overviews. Easy to digest. I like it a lot.
Great post Dan! Thanks for sharing your experiences today!
Thanks Bruce!
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Uh oh. This might apply to me more than is comfortable. I’m going to have to meditate on it. Thanks for the poke 🙂
Thanks James. Something to mull over…that’s all I can ask for. Best in your meditation. 🙂
People need to talk to the Boss not down at the Boss. If there are differences lay them out and clarify with options! It is true we all may not get along but we all can work together in theory, realistically there are people you will never please for various reasons, do your best, be open with your ideas if your told to clam up do so and move on to your next assignment! The Boss may not always be right but the Boss is still the Boss until you become your own Boss! Remember you have choices how you make them can be rewarding or detrimental to yourself!
Thanks Tim. Your insights are so helpful. “Talk to the Boss not down at the Boss…” Golden!
I think we expect bosses to treat us one way, but we don’t hold ourselves to that same standard when it comes to the way we treat them.
I almost forwarded this to my boss.
Thanks Mark. Love it. You got a smile out of me!
Wow, I talk about servant leadership a lot but I’m usally thinking about those who work for me. Because servant leadership turns the org chart upside down, I forget I’m serving everyone, not just one “side” of the org chart. In my organization, the hardest place to be a servant is not with those “below” or “above” on the org chart but those in central staff roles who I think should be “supporting” but they think should be “governing”.
Thanks Paul. I was thinking this morning that it’s easy to put those who are closest to us in a separate category. They don’t need as much encouragement…. etc. Perhaps we think that way about a spouse or children, too. Challenging comment.
I believe we all need to mindfully consider our part in any disconnected relationship, whether boss, peers, or family.
Thanks Peggy. Nicely said.
Thanks for this
Was really helpful
Thanks, Brendon
Thanks Brendon. It’s a pleasure to serve.
These are great points, Dan, and ones I will be able to use as part of my consulting toolkit. It is too bad that they will not help me much with my boss. 😃
Thanks Steven. Great to be useful. Let me know if you need a boss. I’ll be glad to boss you around. 🙂
One way to improve working relationships with almost anyone (including your boss) (and lions) is to use “Team of Two”. Each of you writes down separately “Things I could do to help you” and “Things you could do to help me”, Share the lists, act on the wants you want to. Many of the things to do to help cost nothing, you were just unaware of them. If you are a boss and have a team you can do this with each team member and ask them to do it with each other. You can use your lion’s strengths this way. Just one warning. This isn’t magic. It doesn’t work when people would rather fight than be constructive.
Thanks Nick. Great suggestion.
Nice to meet you Nick,
This “Team of Two” exercise is new to me. WOW what a useful tool. I could have used this several times in my career, and will begin using it right now. I’ve used similar tools, but none that were as straight-forward and outcome based. Thank you so much for sharing.
Best,
Donneda
On the one hand, it is said: When spider webs unite, they can tie up a lion. On the other, we ask: Is it better for 100 burros to lead a lion, or ONE LION to lead 100 burros?
Bosses are in their positions for a reason–usually for their wisdom and experience. For example, a group of scholars passed by a dead dog. The disciples said: “How awful its smell.” Their master, “How white its teeth!”
The person who has had a bull by the tail once has learned 60 or 70 times as much as a person who hasn’t.
Most the failures of this world in life arise from pulling-in one’s horse as he is leaping. Believe it or not, we learn from our “elder” masters when we listen, ponder, look around, endeavor o “see” (understand), and ultimately assess what’s good and right in the organization. Anyone at any time can figure out what’s wrong and come up with ideas, but not just anyone can articulate an organization’s “wellness”–beyond the fact that it is profitable.
Chesterton told us many years ago: “Take care not to free a camel of the burden of his hump: We may be freeing him from being a camel.”
Yet, many a “nuevo leader”—with good intentions–do exactly that. Today JC Penney’s is prime example.
Thanks Books. I have to say I hadn’t heard the Chesterton quote. It’s brilliant. Thanks for sharing your insights.
For 13 years I tried to be valuable to management, staff and the company but as you said I was seen as troublesome if they don’t like “waves”. So I did “move on” last month.
Thanks Red. You have my best wishes for the future.
hmmm. I just described myself the other day as a “bull in a china shop” when referring to making change happen in an organization. When I see something that needs fixed, I drives me insane to put it on a meeting agenda only to talk about it once a month for 9 months before even starting to do anything about it! Perhaps I have forgotten that patience is a virtue. Thank you for the post. I enjoyed reading it and all the great comments from your readers.
Critical thinking goes downstream, answers go upstream. When the boss asks for a task or project to be completed, asking clarifying questions is good, but at some point we have to take the critical thinking on ourselves. If we continually ask questions we should be figuring out, we are asking our boss to take the weight of the critical thinking. In that case, why does he need us anyhow? Personally, I have been very frustrated with direct reports who need me so incessantly I wonder why I didn’t just do it myself. But when I gave them a job and they came back with an answer (they did the critical thinking) I was free to do what I needed to do knowing they were doing what they needed. And, I love feeling free. Moreover, I love when we are all working hard to move the mission forward and everyone is actively pulling their weight.
You never seize to amaze Dan. Excellent perspective on managing the boss and the team. There was this boss of mine who was impossible to manage since he thought he was the know all and others are misfits. Now what do you do in such a situation? Options are either you throw the towel or work your way around so that you can survive. Initially it was tough. He had fixed notion that culturally we were misfits and were not up to the mark in the new environment. ( Our existing company was taken over by an MNC). There were times when I thought of throwing up. But I resolved that the battle needs to won and i need to prove that I am no less . It took almost an year to bring him around . Still the gaps persisted. But at least the battle was won to the extent of 75%. This strategy was required to be followed along the team and manage it so that the boss is not questioned.
I’m sorry but this is just great fodder for bad leaders, a typical command and control management piece the likes of which weak leaders just love to consume and pass down the chain of command. As a manger you must earn loyalty, trust and respect through your actions and conversations every single day. We should never confuse real influence with the organizational authority bestowed upon us as part of our titles. If you find yourself needing to use “organizational title power” often then it’s time to look inward. Not everyone is cut out for leadership and there are many lions out there that need a good poking now and then. Have the courage of your convictions and poke the boss if you believe he has not earned the teams loyalty, trust, or respect. The worst that can happen is you end up a bit bloody.
I liked the first point of “managing the lion” –
“Listen to the questions your boss keeps asking. Answer their questions before they ask.”
This helps with being ahead of the Lion and part of planning ahead.