BUSINESS VIEW : ‘Managing Upward’ Keeps Direction Positive

Businesses, managers and employees in Ventura County and across our nation all too often view management as simply communicating goals and objectives downward as it directs and controls activities of subordinates. But with the continued momentum of corporate downsizing and the increasing feelings of job insecurity and lack of career opportunities, developing skills in the forgotten art of managing upward is critical.

Downsizing has shifted additional work onto the remaining managers and employees. Managers manage more people, have more projects and shoulder more responsibilities. Our “to do” lists continue to grow, and we have precious little time to organize and prioritize--let alone having time to be innovative, creative and proactive. At the same time, employees are feeling insecure about their jobs and unsure of opportunities for career advancement.

The increasing workload and stress have caused us to just focus on our assigned responsibilities and tasks. However, when this type of focus becomes a habit, we hurt our organization and ourselves. By limiting our ability to add value to the success of the organization, we abdicate our own career advancement opportunities and perhaps even jeopardize our jobs by this behavior.

Clearly, employees are a reservoir of insights, energy and suggestions. Managers might have the organizational vision, but employees do the work, and as a result have a deeper operational understanding of detailed task requirements and challenges.

“Managing upward” simply means taking the initiative to support your supervisor in the achievement of his or her objectives and tasks. Managing upward involves understanding the responsibilities and objectives of your supervisor as they fit departmental organizational objectives. Managing upward involves both suggestions and efforts. Managing upward can take many forms and can result in small or large contributions.

Managers play an important role in making managing upward work. By creating an environment that encourages ideas and initiative, managers facilitate the process of managing upward.

At this point you might be thinking: This could work for someone else, but it won’t work for me and my boss. Let me pose several situations.

The telecommunications equipment firm in Thousand Oaks that you work for has grown rapidly and staff meetings have recently been initiated to improve communications and coordination. The facilitator for the meetings rotates among the staff. Yet frustration is building because nothing seems to get accomplished and the meetings seem to be getting longer and longer. Issues and ideas are raised without resolution, and discussion tends to meander. You notice there is no agenda, and you believe an agenda would help improve the staff meetings. Why not share a simple draft agenda with your boss for the next meeting? Although this suggestion and unsolicited work might seem relatively small, the potential improvements are significant--particularly when considering the small investment in time needed to create and implement the suggestion.

Here is a second situation. Your boss has been asked to create a special presentation on how your department provides support to other areas of your Ventura medical services company. After several weeks, though, your boss has not been able to spend the necessary time to make significant progress on this assignment--and the deadline is fast approaching. Do you think your boss would welcome an unsolicited, creative idea with a thoughtful plan to get it done? You bet.

I am sure that you have had many similar ideas that would help achieve departmental and your manager’s objectives. However, how often have you recently taken the initiative, made the suggestion to your boss and then followed up by volunteering time to help implement it?

Clearly, we need to be sensitive in how and when to make a suggestion. However, we also need to realize that we have, through our actions or inactions, an effect on our careers and job security.

As employees, we need to move beyond the mold of viewing management as a one-way downhill street and take deeper responsibility for ourselves and our company. We can no longer just focus on our assigned tasks and responsibilities. We need to look up the corporate hill and identify those opportunities, small or large, where we can manage upward and help add value to our organization.

Try to gain a better understanding of objectives, challenges and issues facing your supervisor as related to departmental and company goals. If in doubt, start with a relatively small, easy-to-implement suggestion--but start. Let’s not become one of the many people saying, “Could have, should have, but didn’t.”

Be empowered. Manage upward.