Always understand what kind of personality your manager has. If you do, you will be able to know what will impress them so that you can enhance your professional persona in order to advance a rung on the ladder of success. By becoming familiar with your manager’s whims, likes and dislikes, you will know what to do and what to avoid so as to make your life in the office more agreeable.
The book The Management of Management by Professor Miriam Carr describes how it is possible to categorize managers into different types. She has classified them by the way they work and how they can be influenced. She advises workers to form an opinion of their manager’s type and then they can negotiate what is expected and required of them in their workplaces.
She describes one very common kind of manager as the Job’s Worth manager, who does not set out to achieve anything at work. Expect to apply every rule the company has rigidly and without question. Everything has to be written down and nothing must be out of place. Never will this manager take a risk. He would rather follow the rules and fail dismally than break them and succeed. Failure is accounted for by the excuse that the requisite regulations were merely being obeyed. With this sort of manager, employees should be diligent in adhering to the rules themselves and should ensure that everything they are instructed to do is put into writing.
Carr says someone who has held his position for some time and who is often middle-aged is known as the Quiet Life manager. This person was probably innovative in his early career but now tends to favour well-worn and trusted polices, avoiding any new ideas which may disrupt the equilibrium of the office. You should deal with them very carefully. Never present him with ideas that he may feel are revolutionary and always quote similar policies adopted by rival companies who have progressed after initiating these ideas.
ã…¡imformations from IELTS passage
