Meridian Group - Company Culture Consultants

Darth Vader? Your dad? Your mom? Or is that your boss you are relating with? It is not unusual for authority figures in our lives to become distorted by our projections, our fears and our personal history. Most employees see the boss as larger than life, which makes it difficult to get to know him or her better. And, many of our feelings about our boss come from childhood, during which we experienced our parents as all-powerful giants. With this historic baggage, it's hard to see our boss as a person like us— with hopes, fears, likes, dislikes, and self doubts. Presidents and bosses are not giants. They put on their shoes one foot at a time. There are some things you can do to establish better rapport with your boss.

Open Up...Start Talking
Most managers feel isolated, left out of the loop. This is partly because employees don't feel comfortable initiating casual conversations with the boss. They leave it up to the boss to initiate a conversation. But improving the relationship with the boss does not have to be a big dramatic event. You might just smile and say hello in the morning, mention your son's baseball game, ask how his or her weekend was. One small comment can open the way to a conversation and a more responsive boss.

For six years, I regularly taught management classes at UC Irvine campus. These were five all-day Saturday classes, one every two weeks. Between each class, the students, all budding supervisors and managers, had assignments to apply class work to their job. One required assignment was "the interview" . Each had to "interview" a person they worked with but did not know well personally. One rule was they could not discuss work. The results were always striking. Here is one example.

This student was in his mid-20s and was a first-level engineer in a consulting company. He felt distanced from the firm's owner who "spent too much time in his office." He decided to invite the owner to lunch and "interview" him. He was very apprehensive. In the next class, he reported that the interview went well and he noticed that the next day, the owner walked around the office talking with other employees. Two years later at a professional conference, the young engineer sought me out to excitedly report that he had been promoted to the office manager. He said this began with the interview.

Work Together
Another effective way to build a relationship with someone is to do something together. This might be formal, such as working jointly on a business project, or more informal, like playing on the unit's softball team or working together on a United Way drive.

It Takes Two...
Unfortunately, attempts to improve relationships upwards do not always meet with success. There are many managers who use their role to isolate themselves and to avoid intimacy. They just find relationships too difficult, preferring to keep employees (and others) at a distance. If your repeated attempts to establish better communications with your boss seem to be getting nowhere, you may just have come up against one of these well-defended (fearful) managers. In that case, there is little you can do. Your best solution is probably to find another position, hopefully with a more open person.

Morphing your boss from giant—or mom, or dad—back to boss/human being, can be a liberating personal experience and one that will carryover into future work settings. This is worthwhile work that you can do, even if you don't have the cooperation of the other person.