Your relationship with your boss is the most important relationship at work.
If you have a good relationship with your manager, they will be more likely to trust you, give you important assignments, and advocate for you when it comes time for raises and promotions.
On the other hand, if you have a bad relationship with your boss, not only life gets stressful, they may be less likely to trust you, give you important assignments, or advocate for you. They may also be more likely to give you negative performance reviews, which can impact your career in a negative way.)
So, it is in your interests to be proactive about managing up.
To help your manager help you.
To build a better relationship with your boss, use my C.A.S.E.D. framework that we teach inside my updated leadership and career coaching programme Elevate:
𝗖 → Connect with your boss’ style.
𝗔 → Align with their priorities.
𝗦 → Share your work.
𝗘 → Extract feedback.
D → Don’t take things personally.
Connect with their preferred style: Some bosses love details. Others love the big picture. Pay attention to your boss’s style and learn to connect with it. Communicate with your manager the way they want to communicate. Everyone has their prefererred communication stye: find out what theirs is, and adapt.
Align with their priorities: Make sure your priorities are aligned with their priorities and goals. If you don’t know their priorities, figure it out fast.
Share your work regularly, as well as your goals: Share your wins, losses, and roadblocks. Tell your manager what you’re working on. Don’t keep them in the dark. Avoid surprises. Keep them in the loop about your goals, hopes and aspirations: have those heart-to-heart chats from time to time.
Extract feedback: Ask your manager for specific feedback and regularly. Don’t assume you know what your manager thinks of you. Extract that information. Ask for the specific examples and details if you’re given vague, or general information. Don’t be shy to ask them for concrete support, be that in getting a coach or a specific training.
Don’t take things personally: This one is huge! Try to get to know your manager as another human being with their fears, concerns and frustrations. Don’t put them on the pedestal in your head. Instead, try to understand them. Many women avoid chitchatting with their managers, not wanting to bother, whereas men are more relaxed about it. Show interest in your boss’ life beyond work (do they have children who’re same age as yours? what are their names? did they go to same school?) The more you see who your boss is beyond the work identity, the easier it will be to build a good relationship with them.
If your relationship has friction, figure out which ingredient of the CASED framework is the root cause.
Take the next step and try to fix it.