Evaluating Your Boss

If the tables were turned, could your supervisor take the criticism?

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10 Tips on Confronting a Difficult Boss

1. Discharge destructive emotions. If you are angry or frustrated and want to just blast your boss, talk things through with a trusted friend or talk into a tape recorder before your meeting.

2. Think it through. Write down your goals and what you expect to get out of the meeting before you begin. Write down specific behaviors and incidents from the recent past that illustrate the need for change.

3. Step into their

shoes. Make a list of what you believe to be important to your boss, both in terms of organizational priorities and personal issues, such as status, image, financial stature and being well-liked.

4. Introduce the topic. At your meeting, tell your boss you are interested in finding out how you can help her better meet organizational goals. You have seen how certain changes could be beneficial and you would like to help. Begin by articulating what she will get out of making certain changes.

5. Get their point of view. Ask your boss what organizational goals she is being held to. Find out how she is being assessed and how she sees her work world. Ask her what is important. How well do these match your notes from step two and three?

6. Understand their barriers and needs. Ask her what is getting in the way of meeting her goals. Find out what helps her achieve his goals and how you and others can help. Get specifics.

7. Offer your ideas, suggestions and help. Suggest to your boss that you see ways in which she might be able to better achieve her goals by changing certain behaviors. Use examples that you wrote down in step two to illustrate ways in which her behavior was unhelpful and what she might have been able to do instead.

8. Ask her to give you the same kind of feedback. It is almost never just one person's fault. Ask her to talk about your behavior, your performance and how it, too, has contributed to the status quo. What attitudes and behaviors would you need to change to help your boss accomplish her professional goals?

9. Practice the rules of fair fighting and good active listening. Use "I" statements instead of "you" statements. Use clarifying and confirming techniques to make sure that you did hear her right and also to let her know that she has been heard.

10. Listen more than you talk and before you talk. Make good use of questions. Be open to learning something new or rethinking things in a new light. Try to treat this as mutual problem-solving activity rather than a confrontation in which your boss is your adversary.

— Elizabeth Gibson, PhD, management consultant and author of Big Change at Best Buy: Working Through Hypergrowth to Sustained Excellence(Davis-Black)

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The Qualities of Good Management

Bad management does not occur just in hospital settings, says Frank Shipper, PhD, professor of management at the Franklin P. Purdue School of Business at Salisbury University, Md. "It's in practically every organization that I've dealt with," he says.

Shipper says the research he has done with the survey firm Clark Wilson Group, Boulder, Colo., has found around 60 percent to 70 percent of the people in managerial

positions don't have the skills required to do their jobs effectively. After determining the qualities needed to be a good manager, the group compiled the following list of skills:

• Vision
• Establishing strategic and operational objectives
• Understanding the changing environment
• Managing financial drivers
• Expertise in the ability to solve problems
• Risk-taking (ability to be decisive and take stands on unpopular issues)
• Empowering employees (ability to listen to employees and encourage their participation)
• Building a team environment
• Coaching for performance (ability to encourage others in their jobs and careers)
• Openness to feedback (ability to accept advice from others — both positive and negative)
• Valuing diversity (ability to acknowledge and value differences in perspectives and cultural backgrounds in the workplace)
• Standards of performance (ability to communicate high performance standards to others)
• Clarity of communication and persuasiveness
• Managing conflict
• Delegation
• Goal pressure
• Recognizing and rewarding others
• Building trust
  

"We've been able to correlate leadership skills with things like employee absenteeism and turnover," Shipper says. "We continue to find that there is no substitute for good leadership and good management. It shows up in employee morale and in the bottom line results."

— T.S.

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In his book, Work Motivation in Organizational Behavior (Prentice Hall, 1998), Craig C. Pinder writes, "Most people wish to work and perform well on their jobs but are prevented from doing so by the restrictive practices of their supervisors."

So how can employees get their day in court to let their bosses know that their poor managerial skills are having a negative effect on the rest of the team? As corporate America grows and the workforce becomes more restless, upper management is looking for different ways to keep the "little people" happy.

Talking to the boss about his faults could be detrimental to an employee's career, so the first steps should be caution and careful planning.

Approaching Your Boss

Terri Hoehne, SPHR, director of human resources (HR) at Aurora University, Ill., says there are a number of ways to initiate communications with a problem manager.

For employees suggesting a manager's review, Hoehne says it will depend on the culture of the workplace. "If you have an organization where employee input is acceptable and valued, then employees should ask their boss about governance programs within their institution (i.e., how the complaint process works). This may help employees contact management if they have a problem with their supervisors," she says. One benefit is that the request will be coming from a group of employees instead of just one person, says Hoehne, who previous to Aurora University worked for 15 years as the director of human resources at a hospital.

Hoehne says a good way to make the process less adversarial for managers is to implement the evaluations across the entire institution as opposed to just one area. Otherwise the manager is going to feel singled out if the employees in radiology want to evaluate them, but those in radiation therapy don't come up with the same idea.

"Getting the process instituted can be difficult if it is coming from the employees," Hoehne says. If available, an employee group or union acting as a "middle man" is an easier way for employees to present their concerns to HR or management.

Robert Hogan, PhD, suggests employees go through HR first. Hogan, an industrial psychologist and president of Hogan Assessment Systems, a psychological testing and employment consulting firm in Tulsa, Okla., says, "Employees have to get HR to put the evaluations in motion." He urges employees to contact HR anonymously in case their boss is not happy with the idea. "Retaliation is a fact of life," he adds.

But if the manager is the type of person who is comfortable with feedback, Hoehne says, then it may be the manager who suggests being evaluated by the employees as part of the regular review process. "That typically happens if you have a manager who is pretty sure they are going to get either honest or positive input from the employees," she says. "You probably won't get a problem manager suggesting an evaluation because they already know there is some friction in their department and would rather not have anything bad come up."

The 360 Review

Hogan says there are two standard ways of evaluating the boss: the "360 review" and the climate survey.

A 360 review allows all subordinates who work for a particular manager to evaluate performance using a standardized reporting format. A climate survey invites the entire workforce or department to comment on management practices within the organization. In other words, a 360 review focuses on a particular manager, while a climate survey focuses on the management. "In either case, the evaluation will be a group thing," Hogan says. "It won't be a single individual commenting on a single manager. You should use one process and/or the other."

Hogan says it's best to use a climate survey to get a sense of overall management practices in an organization. When the problem of employee concerns is targeted to a specific department, then a 360 review can be carried out to determine which manager in that part of the operation is the cause of the problem.

"In regards to hospitals and HR departments, the real action would probably come from the board," says Hogan. "HR departments are notoriously chicken — particularly if it looks like a lawsuit is coming because of abusive behavior. The instigation for this will probably come from the board. However, individual employees don't typically have access to board members."

Eric A. Spanitz, president of Synergest Inc., a Chicago-based management and training firm, says his company performs a 360-degree assessment designed specifically for evaluating managers in a safe, non-threatening way to determine their proficiency and effectiveness of managerial skills.

"As with any 360, the results are anonymous," Spanitz says. "To avoid any kind of singling out, we require that a minimum of 10 managers be selected. A "full 360" is when you talk to as many people as you can who have contact with that boss — sometimes including the customers."

The consultant then pulls all the information together and conveys the feedback to the boss, including areas for improvement or any future development opportunities. Overall statistics — not identifiable with any individual — are also provided to the organization to get a sense of maturity and aptitude. "We try to clean up [the comments] so you can't figure out who said what," Spanitz says.

Spanitz says the 360 review is the most formal and most effective approach, but it's also the most expensive. Not counting travel expenses, he says the cost is approximately $1,200 per person reviewed. "To most organizations, that's out of the question," he says "A lot of people don't realize that just doing an overview of best practices gets a lot of discussion going in a non-threatening manner."

Training Seminars

Spanitz says a simpler, cheaper and just as effective method to evaluate the boss is to conduct a two- or three-day seminar on management best practices.

"We have found it very effective to be the facilitator in cross-hierarchical discussions about what works or doesn't work for the organization," Spanitz says."That way, the consultant is the real voice — not the individual employees — that hints at what might or might not work for the bosses." Most savvy managers in the group will realize that, even if they do things one way, it may be in the team's best interest to try the proven best practices suggested, he says.

Spanitz notes in some cases, it's most effective if the boss and their employees are in the same room during the evaluation. "Our consultants are perceptive to note the subjects people are talking around or certain facial expressions on employees," he says. "The consultants can then bring up topics without naming names."

It's also important for supervisors to understand they should not try to influence employee evaluations, she says. "Obviously, good management over the course of a year, not the last two weeks, is what should be reflected in these evaluations. For instance, a manager should not take an employee out to dinner to influence an evaluation."

The supervisor should be made aware that the process is set up so no individual employee can be identified from the feedback and that no retaliation is considered appropriate, Hoehne says.

When You're Finished

Getting the chance to evaluate your boss's performance is one thing; how your boss receives the feedback is another. Some consulting firms, like Hogan's, recommend you go through a third party to collect and evaluate the feedback.

"No sensible organization will be interested in the opinion of a single employee about a single manager because you get paybacks and score-settling," Hogan says. "You want some consensus within a group of employees that the person [in question] is a bad guy so the company has something to act on. If you have just one person complaining, it could just be a malcontent. There are lots of bad managers in the workforce," Hogan notes, "but there are also a lot of jerks."

For the managers not doing their job, Hogan's firm advises them to "clean up their act," then returns six months later to re-evaluate. If they haven't improved by then, Hogan suggests they be dismissed.

Answering the question, "How do you handle a boss that does not take criticism well?" Spanitz replies, "With a little bit of humor."

He says most bosses will accept advice if it is presented to them in the right way. "When you say to them, 'You need to do this' and back it up with 35 years worth of research, it takes away from the individual's faults and compares the performance against best practices. Most people are smart enough to say, 'Well, there's always room for improvement.'"

For the manager who still doesn't show any improvement, Spanitz recommends one-on-one coaching or mentoring. After a recent two-day training course at a company in California, he says the employees made a number of suggestions that prompted upper management to begin a mentoring program in order to take a few key managers to the next level of expertise.

At the end of each seminar, Spanitz prepares a formal recap, without naming names. He says the write-up may include things like "When we discussed estimating, the general consensus is that the organization doesn't give enough time for estimates." Spanitz says that the write-up is the employees' comments passed on to management.

Hoehne suggests the employee feedback go to the supervisor's boss. The director should compile the information in a manner that presents a group consensus. For instance, if three of the five employees interviewed give reasons there is extreme favoritism in the department, but a harsh application of the tardiness policy, then there are some clearer indicators to discuss. The director can then go back to the supervisor, discuss the feedback and correct any problems.

"It's more of a working tool," says Hoehne. "I don't think reporting feedback comment for comment is the way it should be done. There's got to be a buffer."

Team Environment

Susan Schubert, MA, of Schubert-Kravitz Associates, Pickerington, Ohio, looks at the employee/boss situation in which the overall goal is to do a better job. Schubert-Kravitz Associates provides training, focusing on teamwork leadership and communication.

Schubert asks, "How can I as an employee working directly for you do a good job in my day-to-day work, as well as in my relationship with you so we have a productive business relationship and get the outcomes that we want?"

"I think if an employee frames everything in that context, it's going to be much more effective, as opposed to 'I can't stand you. You're driving me nuts,'" say Schubert, who is co-author of "Managing Upward: Strategies for Succeeding with Your Boss" (1992, Crisp).

She notes that it is imperative for the employee to immediately deal with any problems that arise with the boss and not let them escalate. "Start while it's small," Schubert says. "Create an environment in which the conversation can be held in a low-stress manner. Don't say, 'I want to do a 360 performance evaluation on you,' but rather, 'I think something that would facilitate our work together would be to have regular meetings to discuss issues on an ongoing basis.' You have to establish the framework in which you can have a conversation," Schubert says.

During the conversation, the employee should first clarify his or her job duties, then explain to the boss some of the concerns. (For example, "Sometimes I can't do as good of a job as I know we would all like me to do because you get information to me late," or "I'm confused by the information you give me. I really need you to be more clear about your expectations.") Be as specific as possible on examples.

Schubert says the meeting should be contained within the envelope that the overall goal is to work together to help the employee do a better job. It should not be about faults, she says, rather a progression of dialogue. If the boss is not responsive to the employee's feedback, Schubert encourages the employee to give some examples of recent problems, keeping in mind that no one is trying to find blame, just improve work performance.

As the meeting comes to a conclusion, the employee should reiterate the points agreed upon, make notes about the meeting, give a copy to the boss and recommend meeting on a regular basis. The meeting should be kept to a one-on-one if possible.

If the boss is still not receptive to the employee's concerns, it may be necessary to involve HR or another third party as a negotiator. But first, find out what the company's complaint process is. And make sure you have everything documented.

— Tom Schaffner is the editor of RT Image. Questions and comments are encouraged and can be directed to tschaffner@rt-image.com.