My Boss Doesn't Know Anything!!

If you are higher up in the organization, often you might have faced this situation. An employee who is technically very strong comes to you and complains that he cannot work for his new manager as he doesn’t believe that the new manager is any more capable than he is. More often than not, he is referring to the technical skills of his new boss. 

I have heard slightly different complaint from some of my friends who are at middle management level in their respective organizations. They claim that their manager is of no use. They have no clue why their boss’ boss gives her so much weight and takes her wherever he goes. 

Let us take a deeper look at both the scenarios.

In the first scenario, the employee strongly believes that he knows more than his boss. The fallacy of this argument is that the employee thinks the skills and personality needed to do his boss’ job are same as his job. This is why most of the technical people fail to become good managers. When they become managers, they try to compete with their own team members and try to prove that they are the best at what their team members do. They don't realize that their primary job is to get the best out of everyone in the team and not to be the best technical person in the team. Their focus should be providing the team with the right environment that allows the team to be most productive.

The second scenario mentioned above occurs more often after the employee has made progress through organization structure. Most likely his current boss was his peer at some point of time, or she might have been brought from outside to become his boss thus blocking his growth in the company. It is clearly evident from my friend's situation that his boss’ contribution is highly valued by her boss. Of course, my friend sees that as favoritism. Trust me, no successful executive wants to carry excess baggage that is not going to help him with his own success. Your boss and her boss are in those roles because they are helping the organization to be successful. If you really don’t think what they are doing is right and you are better than them, it is time for you to quit your job and become your own boss!!

In both scenarios, employees are stuck at their respective levels and start thinking that the people bypassing them are not good enough or even incompetent. They strongly believe that they got there due to office politics. I am not saying that mistakes don't happen. When a competent executive makes a mistake, he quickly cuts his losses. If he doesn't, his boss will cut her loss and let him go. 

So spend your energies on how you can make your boss successful and you will automatically be successful in that process!!