Communicating and leading, one lesson a day

Imagine you run school programs at a regional aquarium. Your director has asked for a plan to handle a surge of spring field trips. You have staffing numbers, bus-arrival problems, and three possible schedules. You also know that your director is juggling a facility inspection and a difficult budget review. If you walk into the meeting focused only on your own plan, you may leave angry that a good idea went nowhere. Today's lesson is about managing up: taking responsibility for how you work with the person who has authority over your role.

This is not flattery or office politics. It is a practical skill built on mutual dependence. John Gabarro and John Kotter introduced this idea in their 1980 Harvard Business Review article, “Managing Your Boss.” Their central point is still useful: you and your manager are two fallible human beings who need different things from each other. Your manager needs your knowledge and execution. You need their decisions, cover, resources, and access. The person who understands both sides can make the relationship work better.

People who have spent years working independently often find this especially strange. When you control the work, you decide, build, and deliver. Inside a larger organization, someone else's understanding of the work affects which ideas receive time and money. Shaping that understanding is not a character test. It is a skill, and it may be one you never needed before.

Gabarro and Kotter describe two sides of the task. Begin by learning the manager's world. Which outcomes matter to them now? Which demands are coming from their leaders, customers, or targets? What do they handle well, and what tends to escape their notice? Which form of communication helps them think?

A reader may want a short document before talking so there is time to think alone. A listener may understand the issue by hearing it worked through aloud. Send a listener a long document without context and it may sit untouched. Bring a reader a complicated surprise in a live meeting and they may spend the whole time trying to catch up. Communication is not complete when you send information. It is complete when the other person can use it.

Then study your own side. Identify the support you need, the way you naturally communicate, and the points where your habits clash with the manager's. The authors describe two common failures. A counterdependent person treats ordinary oversight as an insult and resists instructions on reflex. An overdependent person hides every disagreement, agrees in the room, and resents it afterward. Neither one is managing the relationship. Both are reacting to it.

So what do you do in practice?

First, learn how the person wants information and use that form. You can ask directly: would a one-page summary before the meeting help, or would you rather talk through the options together? That question is normal and useful. It tells the other person you care about making their attention easier to use.

Second, make expectations explicit in both directions. Friction often begins when the same conversation produces two different memories of the agreement. Close the meeting by saying it back in plain language: I will revise the volunteer schedule by Thursday, and you will confirm whether facilities can open the side entrance. That is not needless process. It is cheap insurance against a week of misaligned work.

Third, create no surprises. Managers usually handle bad news better than late news. If one of the aquarium's education rooms may be unavailable, raise it while the schedule can still change. A problem reported early is something you can solve together. The same problem revealed when buses are already booked becomes a trust problem, and trust is much harder to repair than a calendar.

Fourth, use the person's time selectively. Batch small approvals. Bring large problems with a recommendation attached. There is an old rule that makes this simple: bring the problem and a proposed solution together. Your director should hear, I recommend two arrival waves because it reduces crowding without adding staff, not simply, what should we do about all these buses?

Managing up also changes how you read emotion. James Gross's research on emotion regulation shows that acting early is cheaper than suppressing a feeling after it takes hold. If you know before the meeting that your director is dealing with an inspection, a brief reply is less likely to feel like a verdict on your competence. It may simply be pressure passing through the room. That does not excuse disrespect. It keeps you from turning every strained moment into a story about yourself.

There is one more trap. People often present their best idea as a finished object. Then they are confused when the person above them does not adopt it. A finished idea can leave no handle for anyone else to grab. Adam Grant has written about the value of giving people a way to shape an idea. Try: here is my recommendation, here is the part I am least sure about, and here is the choice I need from you. People are more likely to support work they helped improve.

The practice is ten minutes of preparation before your next meeting with a manager. Write three lines. What outcome does this person need from the conversation? What pressure are they carrying that is not about you? How do they best receive information? Then open with your recommendation, leave one real handle for their input, and close by saying back what each of you agreed to do.

That is the lesson. Managing up is shared work, and doing your half on purpose makes better ideas easier to hear and easier to act on.