As we enter a new year, many of you might be heading back to work with a new year appraisal looming and if you have a difficult boss to deal with, you could be getting a little worried about how to communicate with them without things going south.
We asked our expert relationships advisor Kathryn Eisman for some advice on how to deal with a difficult boss. Here are her tips.
1. Speak your bosses language, but speak it in their communication style. however your boss likes to communicate with you, be it face-to-face meetings, emails, IM or txt- tune into their preferred form of communication and mirror it.
For example, if they are keen on emailing you rather than scheduling face-to-face meetings, dropping by their office to discuss every issue that pops up is bound to annoy them and put a strain on the working relationship.
2. No matter what the job title reads on your business card, never forget that in addition to using your talents to help the company reach it’s goals, your main objective is to make your boss look good.
Being tuned into this objective will help you identify ways you can further assist them and be or greater value to the company. When you stat to make their life easier they are bound to value you more highly and want to keep you around.
3. Avoid the temptation to become “best friends” with your boss. It’s a very female desire to “win over” your boss and become best buddies with them. And whilst it may initially appear to have it’s advantages- it often leads to a myriad of other problems down the road.
4. If you have a boss making your life difficult, rather than wishing they were different (or dead) or even trying to change them, simply seek to change your view of them.
Seek to understand where they might be coming from and what pressures they may be under.
Sometimes simply changing your outlook is enough to not only gain a great understanding for them, but can subtly alter your behaviors towards them enough to shift the tides.