Yahoo.com offers up a unique article titled Five Myths of Managing Up that purports to help employees communicate more clearly with their boss. I don’t know – many of the suggestions seem like sucking up to me.
For instance:
Conventional wisdom: If you’re even five minutes late, the boss will think you’re a slacker.
Why it’s a myth: In an age of flex time, telecommuting, Blackberries, and instant messages, bosses care more about whether you’re getting the job done than whether you’re warming your seat.
Try this instead: Make sure the boss knows you’re putting in extra hours at home or on the road, both by maintaining a rapid-response email or instant message presence, and by hinting at when you’re putting in those extra hours.
Example: “I had to work over the weekend on this report, but I think you’ll agree the extra effort was worth it.”
The example statement is, well, pathetic. If I was this person’s boss, I would laugh at that self-promoting comment. My perspective is probably skewed by years in sales, but these mental gymnastics involving excuses, shameless self-promotion and explanations of effort are pointless.
Be on time – how hard is it? If your boss is waiting, you can expect to hear about it.
The other issue is the commentary about effort. Obviously effort is important in being a strong employee (how about some effort to be on-time?). But salespeople are not paid based on effort, they are paid based on success – i.e. closing deals. We’ve seen plenty of salespeople who work hard and close little. At the end of the day, those employees can feel good about their effort but it is doubtful that they will keep their job without bringing in business.
Sucking up won’t save them.