Employees are often scared of their managers—after all, managers have a tremendous amount of power over their direct reports.
But, what we perceive as reality isn’t always true. There are some things your manager would really prefer you didn’t know.
Here are five of them:
1. I Can’t Fire You
Sure, one of the definitions of manager tends to be hire/fire power, but the reality is, in the vast majority of companies managers don’t have the ability to unilaterally fire their employees. What they do have the power to do is recommend a termination, but they can’t carry through without a sign-off from the Human Resources department and their boss, and often the boss’s boss.
Why is this? Well, companies have set policies in place for terminations. Usually, if the reason for termination is poor performance, companies have a set 30, 60 or 90 day performance improvement program (often called a PIP) that the manager must go through in order to terminate. This gives the employee a chance to fix problems and avoid termination.
Now, this doesn’t mean that if you get caught stealing you won’t be kicked to the curb by the end of the day, but everyone will be happy to sign off on that quickly.
Companies want to make sure the procedures are followed so that there isn’t anything unfair. The policies allow for double checking to make sure no one is terminated because of race or gender and that similar consequences happen for similar bad behavior.
To read the other 4 things, click here: What Your Boss Doesn’t Want You to Know
Read more: http://www.business.com/management/5-things-your-manager-doesnt-want-you-to-know/
I really enjoyed this article. Great info to have as an employee, and to file away for when I one day manage.
This article was a fun perspective. I completely agree with number 4: Sometimes managers have to carry out things they don’t agree with. Good managers know how to balance that and present good arguments toward their managers but remain professional when relaying to their team. Thanks.
1. I can’t fire you but I can choose between trying to recover you, foisting you off on some other manager, or making your professional life miserable.
2. I may not know what I’m doing, but if I am a good leader I am striving to learn quickly and am emotionally secure enough to listen to feedback.
3. Yes, I have favorites. These are the people who get results (legally and ethically), who learn, are curious, work well with others, don’t complain, give more. I invest my time in those who have and demonstrate potential and “fire in the belly”.
4. Yes, I do support things I don’t like. One of the reasons I am your boss is that while I strive to be a good leader, I also strive to be a good follower. Be assured that in a professional way I have told my boss what I don’t like and have offered suggestions for improvement. Sometimes I need to accept No for an answer. That is the way of organizations.
5. I wish I could give you a raise or promotion, but those excessively tight holders of the company’s pursestrings in HR won’t let me. What I can do with little or no approval from my boss or HR is to send you for more training, actively coach you, transfer you to another department where you will learn more and faster, give you more exposure for the work you do, give you highly visible projects with the assurance that I’ll be mentoring you from the shadows so your project will surely be successful, and make sure you get the recognition you’ve earned. Don’t wait for me to offer these alternatives to you, ask for them.
I can Fire you is only in case when you are lacking in your Performance, in other cases the very first thing you see after acting stupid is your termination letter.
~Tallat