How was the best manager you ever had? What specifically made them exceptional in their role? How did their management style impact your performance and job satisfaction?
On the flip side, how was the worst manager you ever had? What actions or behaviors contributed to this negative experience?
How did it impact your professional growth, pay and entitlements and work environment? Kindly refrain from mentioning specific names or identifiable information about individuals.
Best manager was supportive, enthusiastic, really cared about the team, cared about the growth of their subordinates, open to new ideas, really knew their way around the business and life in general. The type of person you would go to for any sort of advice. Also an actual SME of the work invovled.
Worst manager was unsupportive, never gave you the time of day, never gave feedback (good or bad), never approved requests or suggestions to try new things, played favourites, created a classist vibe. The type of person who seems clueless about what they're doing and you wonder how they got to where they are. Came from a management consulting background so could use their mouth well but had nothing else to offer.
Obviously job satisfaction was greatly decreased under the worst manager but I don't think I didn't grow in either case because growth is up to the individual not the manager IMO. I can learn new stuff and try new things even if it means I do spend more time at work. The work environment was definitely worse under the worst manager and overall morale was lower which lead to disinterest in the role over time.
At the end of the day though even if you're surrounded by bastards who should've been fired long ago or great people, your performance is up to you. You can choose to slack off and do the bare minimum or push through and do your best and show those idiots what's up.
or push through and do your best and show those idiots what's up.
Somewhat disagree, bad managers can actively sabotage you, take credit or redirect credit away from you, etc. Sure, it doesn't stop you learning on your own time or seeking new better positions, but they can easily successfully quell your career growth and training opportunities at work.
Even with a good manager, in my experience performance is only loosely correlated to
professional growth, pay and entitlements
RICH PEOPLE LOVE THIS GUY
My worst manager was a woman and a micromanaging nightmare that didn't know how to do her job.
My best was a different woman mainly because she left me alone for the most part and trusted me to do the job.
I only ever had one female manager who left me alone.
But that's because I was stuck in a team full of other women who'd annoy me on her behalf.
I'm guessing you work in PR, HR or marketing?
@TightLikeThisx: I've been lumped in with marketing often in past jobs but I'm not a marketer myself.
Downvoters all women, typical.
I’m puzzled. How do you know that no men have downvoted you?
I know that at least one man has
Something tells me both men and women give you a wide berth
My wife of 15 years says otherwise.
I didn't grow up thinking like this. It's all down to my actual workplace experiences.
I can’t think of a bad female manager I’ve had (in fact one of the best managers I’ve had was female). Not to say they don’t exist.
There’s a saying in tech. If you come across the odd a-hole at work, then they’re probably the a-hole. If everyone you come across is an a-hole, then you’re probably the a-hole.
No all the bad managers he had were women and they did not leave him alone.
He wrote that. So it makes no sense that “something tells you” when in fact you have been informed explicitly the opposite.
Of course he could have had good managers that were women too. It’s not stated.
I had 2 women as managers. One was a nightmare from hell and the other didnt say boo and left me alone to do my job. On the flip side the only other bad manager I had was a man. He would micro manage people to death but worse he would berate and yell at people in public.
Best manager was one that gave me time off work to pursue my dreams.
Worst manager was the one who told me that helicopters for hands were not useful, practical or even possible, and that I should find a different dream.
Is this because their father beat them with jumper cables, when they were a child?
Best: Trusted me and left me alone to do my work. I was more productive, stress-free and he was happy with my work before deadlines. He had no problems with me, he wasn't a micro-manager.
Worst: Same company when there was a manager change
- Micro-managing through Covid lock-down. My team had an agreement to come to the office 3 times per week, 2 days home, he wanted us 5 days a week in the office cause he was a major extrovert. You know, the type who comes in the office talking to everyone for 10 minutes before starting work at noon and brown-nosing everyone so he can be liked by everyone. He lived 10 minutes away, I lived 50 minutes away and he couldn't fathom the fact that it's "easy" to come to the office everyday. I declined.
- I worked in graphic design, he had ZERO knowledge on anything design related and he wouldn't learn anything design jargon related
- Every version 1 design was accepted with anyone in the company, I am good at my job. With him, it lead to version 2,3,4,5…… then ultimately, version 1 will ALWAYS win….. I wasted days and weeks coming up with new designs for only version 1 to be accepted
- He was a meerkat, in the open office, when there's a conversation around, he ALWAYS needed to pop is head up and 80% of the time join the conversation
- No one knew what he did as a job, multiple people came to me and said "what does your manager do?" and I said "i dont know"
- He only got the job because the CEO knew him from a pod-cast. He had zero manager skills on a 6 figure pay (accidentally blurred out by HR when she was drunk. Quote: "im in the wrong role, he's on 120k with no experience")
- He would walk past my desk which was 2 seats away from him and keeps looking at my screen
- He would want me to put job tasks in app 'Monday' to check my workload and progress which he NEVER checks.
- He would message me before and after work saying "X Y Z needs to be done". Mate, say it during work hours
- He would create useless meetings with the team to make himself look busy
This lead to work being delayed to others, unhappy to go to work, dreading to look at my phone cause his name constantly pops up, annoyed that he micromanages, annoyed for him to even be in the same space, I didn't want to speak up cause there's no point talking him unless is deadline related, just sent my files to him to approve and even then each time was like "I wonder what stupid changes he wants"……..
I am a professional, I know what I am doing, I never had a problem with major corporate companies I worked for Maccas, PayPal, Blizzard, Dare and other smaller companies that rarely had a problem with my designs and yet this guy manages to undo all my hard work because his design vision sucks and I am just a person to create his crappy designs which doesn't work at the end.
Nightmare, thank god I got out.
He sounds like a political parasite than someone who is useful or even just a good vibe.
This.."- He would walk past my desk which was 2 seats away from him and keeps looking at my screen"…just Wow..cracked me up and creepy at the same time
I'm loving the salt on this & similar comments.
It's like they get off on extrapolating the worst case scenario, i.e. you probably keep women in your basement and beat them.
best one: female
worst one: male
sexist
If it wasn’t obvious enough, I was just replying with an equally irrelevant comment. Gender is an irrelevant descriptor of a manager’s job performance.
@Usernames: In turn, if my remark wasn't obviously facetious enough - I was commenting that society (read: immature people on the internet) make comments like that in one direction only. It was intended to bring yours into sharper relief. I am a fool for attempting to do that in an OzB comment chain though.
Best that who stands up for you, when shit hit the fan.
Best is manager who stands between you and fan.
Manager is the shit, when best hits the fan
Honestly, any manager that will stand up for you and hold an umbrella over you while superiors throw grenades at each other is a manager that i'll happily work for.
I've seen teams crumble because their manager refuses to own their team's performance and throws their group under the bus.
My current manager does a great job at looking after me, he's harsh but fair and the best thing is the amount of autonomy that he allows.
Fully agree. My best ones are they ones that try to shield you from all the politics etc and stand up for the team. They were hard, demanded high but very fair
ok worst manager
I was working on a project and the manager had no clue what he was doing.
Old dude who had worked their his whole life. got promoted as old boys club.
He kept emailing the department sexist/racist jokes and i kept forwarding it to HR.
Worst was a situation where I (amongst others) were flatly told not to contact anyone in the company for input, with all contact to go through that person. This was a consulting style engagement.
Work would then get done with no real idea of what stakeholders were looking for. We'd wait days/weeks for feedback and then be told it "was wrong". Upon asking what was required, feedback was very vague. Work was redone and … surprise, surprise … it was still wrong, in fact it was "never" right.
The whole thing got packed up inside four months and to this day it was the greatest waste of my time and their money I've ever encountered.
Best: brought in from Europe. Expert in his field, totally empowering and trusting even on work I had Nfi about, just said whatever I decide will be best etc. would back you to the hill if there was ever issues etc. when he could take the recognition he always passed it on, always looked for opportunities for his team to step up their impact (eg sending jnr team member to meetings with execs etc)
Worst: no care, not smart, forgot about our small team within her portfolio and others had to remind her at function wide meetings when she was giving updates and left us out, would make decisions that impact your work without any idea of the consequence and not take guidance on the work (team were SMEs). She was eventually fired, which was very rewarding.
Best: caring, an advocate for all of use with the higher ups, knows her stuff
Worst: Sexual harassments involved, franchisee promoted him and transferred me.
Best manager was at McDonald's. He'd flirt with me and grab my ass. I should have gone for it 😂
hey is that you Bianca?
I didn't know you were a local in the LaTrobe Valley.
Can't go for it when all the staff walk out and go on strike.
Sounds like some of you guys have trouble with women as managers. You mention the gender but not the issues. Forgive me if I don’t back your judgement.
Sounds like you have trouble with people having a negative experience with a female manager, so forgive me if I don't back your judgement of their judgement.
The point is they were just highlighting they were female, which is irrelevant, rather than what the issues are. Frankly managers should be judged on their behaviour not their gender. I’ve had good, and bad, managers of both genders and the difference was how they behaved. I just wonder why anyone needed to mention gender at all? They are, obviously, trying to imply something.
I think you read too much into their comments.
I think where the disagreement with female managers are the different ways of behaviours commonly found in both men and female. While it's common to see men in the workforce in manager positions being straight to the point, no bs'ing around. In my experience, I had more than 4+ female managers and while professional, very emotional in the sense where their decisions are clouded by emotional states and can't be calm under pressure while men tend to hide their emotions with such things.
To me, I don't care what sex you are. I only care about if you treat me and the team right, get the work done - that's all that matters.
The best female manager I had was working in retail telco, she came from HQ and was semi-new to managing but she was so laid back and blase but professional that she often sided with the team and didn't give an eff about stupid policies and would bypass them to advantage the customer and the team. She wasn't dodgy, just more ethical. There was a nintendo wii from the online inventory store and she ordered it for the team to play wii at the back on our breaks. It wasn't meant to use for this purpose, the wii was suppose to be ordered for customers who won in said competitions but she said "aint nobody winning that, im gonna order it anyways" and no one questioned us. lol
My best and worst managers were female, as detailed below. In my experience though, it's the males whose judgement has been more clouded by emotion. I had one in particular who got upset any time anything didn't go his way and would be really spiteful and once he had it in for people he would cut them out of everything. For example, there was one person who knew how to do a job. This manager was upset with him because they'd had a civil work disagreement. Said guy moved to a new position that wasn't under that manager. Manager said he didn't want the guy (the only one who knows the job), involved in training the new person. He had tantrums in meetings too.
Had plenty of other ones where their ego required you to do things their way, because they said so, whereas in my experience female managers have been more likely to listen and take on board feedback from people who know what they're doing.
I know where I work now management is very female heavy and it's genuinely a nice place to work where people respect each other, listen to each other and work through problems together.
I think it probably mostly comes down to individual personality and the culture that has been built in the workplace though. I've definitely had good and bad male and female managers.
As a new manager, shit’s (profanity) depressing
100% my best managers have been women
And I'm male
Worst manager was the boss's inexperienced, unqualified and delinquent son. Most useless pos. 3/4 of the office left over a year. The boss was awesome and it was unfortunate he semi retired and let his son mishandle day to day activities.
Worst managers: interestingly, two of the worst were from my time working at a University. No good managers there, only bad ones. Not sure if we can draw a connection between manager quality and the public service (or public service adjacent). In both cases, they were more interested in email wars where the stakes were so small, or in having long lunches, being late for meetings, and generally not giving direction to the department.
That said, had bad managers in industry too. One was a clown who didn't know how to sell his own software product; another was a terrible micro-manager who gave no insight whatsoever into the company's direction but instead provided the most poorly-written 'user story' of something that needed to be done and if we asked for more detail would complain we should know the product better.
My best managers were those who had my back, had a vision for what they wanted to achieve, helped control the many demands for my time and attention from other areas to keep the focus on agreed strategic goals, and who trusted me to do my job well.
Any chance the uni was in Sydney
No, Newcastle.
Back in the 1990's i worked for about 3 weeks in a restaurant in the QVB in Sydney called Calios. They had the biggest menu ever and the smallest cooking space to match. You had to cook multiple dishes in a tiny space AND they ran 3 menus all at the same time.
One day it was a real struggle as their was literally no room and this little short napoleon came into the kitchen shouting at me "where is the food, do you know who i am? I'm Calio, this is my place" he was really obnoxious and was screaming at me. (never met him before)
I stepped back, took off my apron and said "here you go calio its all yours, good luck" and walked out in mid service. I think there was at least 25 orders with room to cook maybe 3 at once..
I wonder how he went
little short napoleon
This would make the late Rex Mossop proud
Interesting story but what did the persons height have to do with it? Why not just say he was an obnoxious person?
Ok..obnoxious little short Napoleon 😆
And obviously i was trying to describe his persona compared to another short little dictator who was probably also obnoxious thst anyone who is at least not gen z or millennial might know from history.
Either way where on earth do you actually think you have ANY kind of say on how anyone writes anything like this? Honestly..you joker. Keep to your station in life
So I point out your are being prejudiced because of someone’s height and you want me to keep to my station in life? You are showing your prejudices not me. You guys certainly don’t like it when your prejudices are uncovered. The way this person behaved was unacceptable not their physical appearance.
Adds a bit of descriptive colour to the story!
Cant say colour
Prepare to be cancelled
@try2behelpful He was/is a man, Calio to be precise. Why must you categorise him as a person ? He is undeniably a man and little to boot, comparable to Napoleon.
Because the gender and height are irrelevant. It is the behaviour that is the issue. The height is being used in a derogatory fashion which isn’t fair.
There is much doubt that Napoleon was actually short for his times.
His shortness may have been English propaganda.
Shaming people for shortness has a long history.
@Eeples: Thanks. That is my point. For some bizarre reason society seems to have an issue with short people, especially men. Of all the things to be prejudiced against that seems the most illogical one I know.
@try2bhelpful: Are you of short stature by any chance?
Seems to be a touchy point for you.
Women generally don’t go for short men so it’s understandable to be upset if your vertically challenged. It’s a bit of a sad reality.
Best Manager: Didn't micro-manage me at all and didn't pressure me with dead-lines so long as she saw you were giving it your best. Was by far the best manager I have ever had. In my 2+ years there she only had a go at me once.
Worst Manager (and a bit of role-play with this one):
Manager: Empharand, can I get you to do this for me?
Me: I'm sorry but I'm absolutely swamped + I have a few time-sensitive tasks because the customers are waiting for an email from me (eg. Quotes, invoices, reports etc). It has been a busy (Insert morning/afternoon) with calls and I haven't been able to get to these tasks prior to now
Manager: Gets up from her desk, and proceeds to power-walk to my desk
Manager: Show me what you have
Me: Proceeds to disassemble the pile of work I have and explain everything one at a time (Thus wasting easily 2+ minutes)
Manager: That will take 30 seconds to do, yep that will take 50 seconds, that can be done later etc etc (Completely inaccurate and impossible estimations + doesn't factor in any further interruptions eg. Calls)
Me: Just gives up and takes her task because I realise it would be more productive to convince a brick wall
This happened weekly
In her defense she was ok in other regards, and she would honour usually up-to 1 hour of OT per day (Which still wasn't enough) which helped $$$$ wise, but pretty much as soon as you say 'No' to her request to handle her excess tasks because she couldn't due to undisclosed reasons it was pretty much as per the above. Me and her were the only ones that could handle a specific spectrum of enquiries and therefore any excess work would be thrown on to me, didn't work both ways.
This can generally occur when the manager had previously worked in the same role and was able to do all of the tasks provided in about half or less the time of the current employee. (Including appropriate consideration of factors that may have changed timing since transitioning away from the role and also taking into account interruptions)
Worst manager runs a protection racket where she puts her best friends and favourites in the back corner. They sit on their phones all day and don't have to do any work.
She participated in office bullying and emotional abuse which saw half a dozen employees leave in the space of a year. She works for a big company and is untouchable
Worst: manipulative, made me us feel guilty for not doing extra shift, bully, sexualising co-worker (eventually got fired because of this), would always take his break and finished on time, left the job for his team to finish and wouldnt pay them overtime. (Because you shouldve finished your job on time).
Best: supportive, appreciated you doing extra shift, bought you coffee every morning, understood when you needed time off, didnt make you guilty, listened to our needs, stood up against big bosses.
Worst manager. Asked me to make sure a get a doctors certificate when i told her I wasn't coming into work because my wife was giving birth to our son.
To be fair your wife would have had to provide a dr certificate for her maternity leave, and you would have had to submit one for your paternity leave too. If this is what you consider your worst manager, it makes you sound like the worst, most daft employee…
I've never been asked for a medical certificate for any reason, including when I took paternity leave. Good managers know when to trust their employees.
That's very different to the norm, providing a medical certificate is standard HR policy for most companies. As an employer you have to provide the government with proof of birth to claim government supported paid parental leave. The mother has to do the same and claim her primary career leave pay from the government through their employer. Not everyone works for some small family business like you. If that's your worst experience in the workplace 1. you've had a pretty good run and 2. you're a sook
@Juice-Wa: I worked for global multinational company at the time and the point is instead of wishing me and my wife well, all she could say was get a doctors certificate. She was a single woman in her late thirties with no partner or children.
Not everyone works for some small family business like you
was in reference to @zoob
I've never been asked for a medical certificate for any reason
So if you work for a global multinational company it is highly likely that this is expected as part of HR policy. While I can understand it wouldn't feel great. Again, if this is your worst boss and your worst experience with her was a time that she didn't provide the pleasantries of a congratulations but instead reminded you of your responsibilities, you're doing pretty well.
@Juice-Wa: Thankyou i am doing very well. I have worked for global companies most of my life and all of them, bar 2 managers, have been wonderful and more importantly professional in dealing with their staff.
Worst: pedantic a-hole who always passed the buck when something went wrong & was more concerned with polishing her metrics/paperwork than actually getting productive work done. Was & continues to be a real political operator too, always snaking others & skipping out on the consequences of her mistakes.
Best one I had is one I have now. Ex building industry, there to get work done, shields his staff from the corporate nonsense from up the chain. Does not tolerate BS but does not dish out BS either.
The first manager managed to fail upwards (like I said, she is a damn political/corporate operator) & is now up the chain from my current manager. He hates her guts as much as I do. I never mentioned I knew her/my opinion of her at first so he arrived at the same conclusions on his own within a week of meeting her. Felt nice to be vindicated.
Worst manager I had micromanaged everyone, let's call him manager A. he had a spy in the group who would report if anyone leaves early or arrives late - too spineless to actually talk to the employer so would just send an email to everyone reminding them of their start time.
He reprimanded employees for drinking soft drink out of wine glasses due to the message it sends, he bullied an employee who was on stress leave, he would constantly make sexist jokes about basically any woman he saw, some of which were friends, he would throw anyone under the bus, even when they do the right thing and he didn't facilitate a safe working environment where employees are encouraged to grow, instead he held us all back. I'll never forget ducking off to the toilet and having him allocate me work from the other stall!
But in the end we had an even worse manager (manager B) who worked us like dogs, but he bullied the manager above something fierce until he (A) couldn't take anymore and left - he ended up losing his job due to refusing to get the jab and is struggling now. Then the new manager (B) left shortly after that, eventually losing his next job due to misconduct - maybe karma does exist afterall.
Best manager I got to work under during COVID after a restructure. Top bloke, encouraged growth, offered training and was "one of the team" rather than acting like a superior, he kicked off so many new initiatives which rocketed our department from the stone age to the 21st century. He ended up leaving after only a short while but requested that I fill his shoes which has helped my family immensely.
Side note, the above replies make me realise I need to be more involved with my small team as I'm a fairly hands off kinda guy (major introvert)
Best one I had was caring, supportive, recognized everyone's ability and trusted us to do what we were meant to do, and always on the lookout for appropriate training and resourcing to boost the team's capability. He had enough experience in the domain that he didn't feel he needed to worry about the fine details anymore, but could certainly get in and understand them and start making appropriate calls when needed. He also stood up to the guy above him who was a real POS and took a lot of heat off us. My current manager is almost as good, just less experienced as a manager.
Worst: he was actually a nice enough guy except I'm pretty sure he had a personality disorder which made him painfully difficult to work with. I thought it was narcissistic PD at first, but he generally treated other people ok (except his wife who he cheated on and left), and then I found out about histrionic PD which seemed to fit him perfectly. He always had to have the recognition and look like the big man and have the best of everything no matter the cost - the best camera, always the "Pro" version of whatever software he was using, and he had a massive bookshelf in his office full of hard copy bound reports and papers that he'd been involved with over the years (including numerous draft versions and duplicates to pad it out), etc. His entire career was in a fairly specialist field and he definitely had a ton of experience, but he was also very inefficient, often changed his mind on what he wanted after work had already been done, would talk at length about unrelated stuff and seemed totally misguided on how a leader actually needed to act. This typically resulted in projects going overdue, with him working early/late, after which he would complain about how busy and stressed he was, how much work was backed up, etc, only for him to go and change plans again. I think he actually learned to feed off the "pity aura" he generated for himself from being snowed-under because he certainly got that more often than the satisfaction and recognition he could get for just accomplishing things.
Best was the one who never left my bed for a 3 day convention we went to
Hold up…
Best: Current manager. She always has the back of everyone in the team. She will push back on anything from above if she doesn't think it's right. She genuinely listens and cares whether it's work or personal. She has chosen an awesome team (everyone in the team was chosen by her), we all just get along, no conflict, no drama. Everyone always listens to and respects everyone else. We don't always agree on everything work wise, but we sort it out amongst ourselves and where she feels it's needed she'll add to it. She doesn't mind when we work as long as we work and she knows what's going on (as she often needs to let other people in the business know when we're available). We all have different skills and are always working on different things, but she knows what all of our skills are and what we're all working on and the things we want to do more of and what our plans are and genuinely supports us with it. Everyone in the team was hired from within the business because of their reputation.
There are a lot more reasons why she's awesome, but to be honest one of the reasons she can be the way she is is because she's built this team from the ground up over the last 10 years, the nature of the work we do and that she's been able to hire based on people she trusts' recommendations and already know if they will fit with the team.
Worst manager: Thought she was in high school still. Got hired because of nepotism. Had a couple of favourites because they stroked her ego and would just bully everyone else. I genuinely did more work than anyone else in the team, I took the time to learn how to do some of the more difficult tasks we had from more experienced people or by trying things to see if it would work, I made sure I did them right and I helped others in the team. All I got from her was her being a generally nasty human and complaints about stupid things like why I didn't do the same number of tasks every day when tasks take between about 2 minutes and half an hour and I was just picking up what I got, often longer tasks that other people had just closed because they couldn't or didn't want to do them. The only person who ever did more than me was the person who only did 2 minute tasks and spent the day telling other people not to touch them and even then she usually didn't do as many as I did. Then a position opened up in another team, the manager specifically requested me, my manager said I couldn't leave because there were too many things only I was trained in because the more experienced staff had left, like it's my problem she doesn't know how to run a team and the SME didn't know how to do anything. Anyway, my new manager set her straight (not my current one, she was also a good manager, but ended up leaving because of the toxic environment where we worked, thankfully I work somewhere else now). I moved into the other team, but I did help out a bit with training people.
The managers I’ve had have left me to my own devices.
For me that’s a good thing but for the company probably not.
Best manager: Current one, stern about delivering your work to a high standard but has an open door to give you all the help and resources to meet them. Very supportive personally, professionally and technically.
Worst manager: AutomationIT in Brisbane, in the few months I was there a graduate quit and in his exit review he told the manager it was because they felt bullied by said manager. Following on from this, the manager called a team meeting where he said that's the second time within 6 months someone has left and given their reason for leaving as bullying. Didn't see this as a queue to change his behavior and claimed it's just because he's Dutch and if anyone takes issue with him they should tell him directly. Mind you, he would not take criticism and couldn't comprehend not being in the right.
Another time I went to complete a job away from home, worked something like 10 hours overtime that week (which was more than the 3 hours unpaid overtime per week allocated in my contract). Tried to put it into my timesheet but he rejected it because he said that I basically spent most of that time standing around. He was referring to the time I spent waiting for security gates to open to let me into different parts of the jail…
Coming back from that job he got real upset that I deviated from the exact commission instructions he sent me with. I tried to explain to him that I followed them but they didn't work, so I had to improvise to get the system up and running due to the old age of the hardware. Wasn't having it and gave me an earful. I then sent an email explaining exactly what I did and the decisions I made, apologising and trying to mend bridges thinking I didn't communicate properly exactly what I did. After that he didn't speak to me, respond to my teams messages, teams calls or emails for a full week (most of the team were working from home during covid). This old Dutch man acted like a little child, when he did speak with me again he told me that you don't tell and engineer with 15 years more experience that you are right and they are wrong (referring to the email I sent him which definitely didn't say or allude to the fact that I thought he was wrong).
Should have seen all the red flags when I went into the interview, being asked "do you offend easily?" is not engrained as a hard avoid from now on. I hope to never cross paths with him again
Had a manager who blamed called his bullying being passionate about work.
No wonder people felt like being bent over in 1 to 1 meetings.
If these people are so passionate about work I don't understand why they bother to take people management roles. They're not passionate about people, they're just arseholes.
Worst manager:
Used to yell and name & shame team members every T1 Toolbox meeting. Luckily I didn't do anything to trigger the guy.
Current manager is very good. I am trusted to get on with things and manage my own workload. No BS, honest and can say anything about frustrations of the job without it being held against you. Also arranged for my team to have permission to only attend the office once a fortnight in response to a broader company requirement to come in two days a week.
Worst are those who see the role as a stepping stone for self promotion, those who instantly hire their mates once they take over and of course the dreaded micro managers. Micro management should only ever occur when its actually needed (e.g. someone has known performance issues).
My best manager was when I was managing myself for 2 months. So relaxing….
Best: I think this project coming soon would interest you. I've put in a bid for it and will let you know if we're successful. You might like to do some extra training as it could be a bit of a stretch. How about doing this course on these date? I realise there's not much notice.
Worst: put me on a performance improvement plan after I said the demands of the job were really stressing me out.
Worst Manager: Worked for an IT company (if you can call it that) called Network Help in Heidelberg, Vic. The bloke running it was an ex high school teacher who ran the place like it was a classroom. Forget having a casual conversation with your colleagues whilst at work. You were yelled at for doing such a thing. Had contracts with some local councils and some schools. Was hell bent on using a flavour of linux for everything even if it wasn't suited to the purpose or environment. Blamed setup issues on engineers rather than building something that would suit the purpose. Massively oversold the position to me. Advertised the renumeration at one rate and then proceeded to lowball me with another rate telling me "It's only for 3 months until you pass your probation period" (this is now a red flag phrase for me with any new job). Promised me a new company car, was given the old company car instead. Expected me to work multiple weekends/weeks away on the other side of the state and was not flexible at all with me when I was applying for any leave.
He went on a business trip to Singapore around the time I decided to get out and find another job. I put in my notice and he pleaded with me to stay until he returned from the trip. Upon his return, the first day he called me into his office, collected the keys to the company car and my company laptop and marched me out the door. I then spent about a month chasing him for my final pay and a further year chasing him via the ATO for unpaid super. He now occasionally stalks my profile on Linkedin. Another employee who started same the week as me, also left the company before I did with a similar experience.
Best: My last two managers have been awesome. Support me with the work I do and with any issues I have had with other business units. Provided further industry training. Didn't micro manage me. It's not hard to be a good manager.
Worst is my current one, female, mid to high 40's. Micromanages, thinks control and ruling with an iron fist make her a good manager, while bullying team mates, misrepresenting our work when reporting it upwards, mocking people behind their backs, and sharing private personal information about team mates with other team mates.
Currently in the process of trying to do something about it, and am myself being made to feel like the attacker and is trying to position herself as the victim now.
It's making my work life (profanity) MISERABLE.
Best one gave me flexibility to complete tasks with some constructive feedback to help develop me. She took all the responsibility required at her paygrade. I likely did most of the work which I was totally ok with.
Worst one was a micromanaging nightmare. In fact the worst 2 were both that.
I have had 2 bad ones from 2 different workplaces:
1. Micromanaged, he thinks he knows everything, if I needed him to check something he would repeat everything I have done in front of me (even went to say oh you are right) before he tried something else different. I once experienced a cheat pain and had to take half of the day off and the first thing he said to me was “you need to bring a medical certificate when you are back”. It was a real chest pain and I even got heart rate read by the GP. I ended up taking a whole week off just to get back to him.
2. Doesn’t know a thing but nosy and want to know everything you are doing. Always tried to cut cost. Doesn’t shield you from unreasonable request by higher management.
I also have a number of good managers, the best one is my current manager. He trusted my work, never checked. Appreciated my work and given regcontion before I even asked for. As the result I am his right hand and both of us got promotions as the result.
I have been through a few bosses in my various jobs, and I've rarely had any "mediocre" bosses, they've all been fairly extreme on either end good or bad.
Worst boss; he clearly only wanted a second-set of hands in order to get tasks done his way, he never wanted people to think on their own. Presentations would be a fortnight long back and forth of changes, and we inevitably would end up in the same place we started. it used to drive me nuts. It ended up that I would submit things to him that were only 75% completed because there would be so many changes that it wasn't worth trying to do it properly to begin with. Similarly i found that i wasn't using my brain properly because i got "trained" to just always ask him for next step. He was a big one for subtly taking credit for things, and other people noticed that part as well. Its crazy to look back and think of just how miserable I was during that period of time, and that I was probably clinically depressed! Best decision i ever made by leaving that role - the biggest advantage was that it looked good on my CV!
Best boss; senior engineer who gave just the right amount of room to use my own brain and skills to make decisions, gave me appropriately sized tasks and projects which would grow my skills and confidence. He checked in to see how i was doing, but not micromanaging, just making sure I had the assistance that I needed to not get bogged down, and offer advice. I don't think he ever knowingly did those things, I think he was just an overall nice guy!
I like to hope that I'm closer to the better boss. I know i'm not a micromanager, but I do hope that I give the support that my team need, assistance and clearing of roadblocks etc
Best one: can you please do some overtime?
Worst one: you're not leaving until you do this, this this this and this.