What Your Boss Really Wants from You

October 17, 2013 Editor 0

It’s 1958, and Patricia Bays Haroski, a State Farm Insurance Company employee, wants people to formally recognize their boss on October 16th. Her goal? Improve the relationship between bosses and their direct reports. That date? She apparently picked it because it was her father’s birthday, and she thought he was a good boss.

Fast-forward exactly 55 years, and today people from the U.S. to Australia, India, South Africa, and six other countries are honoring their bosses (or are at least pretending to). Hallmark currently offers more than 50 National Boss’s Day cards in its outlets.

I would bet, though, that instead of fawning over their bosses, many employees would rather ask them this question: What do you really expect from me?

Even in these times of feverish attention to performance metrics, it’s not always clear what the boss wants or expects. Why? Maybe there’s a presumption that those expectations are already clear and they’re not. Or, maybe the employee is placing pressure on him- or herself to do better (“I am a strong performer, but maybe that’s not enough.”). There’s a joint responsibility to ensure that expectations are well-articulated and understood. But that kind of effective give-and-take doesn’t happen with the frequency or the quality we wish it did.

Do not despair. I’m pretty sure that I can tell you what your boss’s expectations are. I am fortunate enough to work with these people all the time across a span of industries and professions: finance, health care, education, energy, technology. And from my vantage point, the messages are clear and constant. Let me offer what I believe are your boss’s essential expectations. Take a look at them, and see what you think — where you think you’re hitting them perfectly, where you need to ask more, and where you need to do more.

Your boss wants you to be:

1. Relentlessly focused on making your numbers and completing projects or initiatives in a timely, responsible fashion. And if things are regrettably falling short, your boss is expecting some sort of early-warning heads-up.
2. Well aware of the particular numbers or initiatives that are of critical importance to him or her. Are you fluent in those numbers, and do you keep your boss apprised of where they are trending? You should be. Also, if these numbers or projects are veering off course, your boss wants you to come to him or her with the problem early on (and armed with a few well-thought-out possible solutions).
3. On top of the pulse of your organization, and of your customer and client base. You should know where the stress points are and what’s being done about them.
4. Clear on where the business is going in the broader sense and in the longer term. You should have a respectable point of view on where the company should be going and why.
5. Knowledgeable about your people and their people — their strengths, weaknesses, and potential. How do their jobs help the company meet its goals? How are their jobs tied to your organization’s strategy?
6. Building a following of competent people who trust you, trust each other, keep you in the loop, and feel as if you are there to help and guide without getting in the way. Think of the last five direct reports who came into your office. What did they want? What does that tell you about the relationship you have with them?
7. Capable of identifying problems on the horizon, analyzing them, and problem-solving effectively — either alone or in collaboration with colleagues — on a timely basis.
8. Able to play well with others consistently. That is, confident enough to say what you think and also confident enough to hear, respect, and possibly integrate others’ views into your own perspective.

You can use this list in two ways. The first, and most obvious, is to ensure that from your boss’s perspective, you’re hitting on each of those eight cylinders. The second is to think of each of the people reporting to you. Are these the kinds of things you expect from them? Do they know? How do you know they know? Can you make sure?

Imagine how much you would value your direct reports coming through on all eight points. Imagine how valuable it would be to the bosses all around your company if people throughout the organization delivered on those expectations. It might just make their day.

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Categories: HBR, Insights

Tags: boss, Human Interest