There’s an interesting post at Rands In Repose titled The Enemy that covers some of the reactive personas your manager may assume after you tell him you’ve seriously screwed up. Take a moment, read it, cogitate, come back. Quick note: if you’re extra sensitive to seeing the “f” word in print, specifically 22 times per article, then this article isn’t for you. If your f-word cap is 23 times per article, however, commence reading.
Finished reading? Welcome back. What panic-mode management type are you? What type is your manager?
I’ll go first - I’m the Interrogator. I’m not in management, but if I’m giving advice or making a point to a colleague, I ask questions with a reasonably predictible answer, and then build up my recommendation on the back of the answers I receive. As the article states I’m trying to “build a sense of context”. In my case, acting most often as a peer instead of a direct manager, it’s a sense of mutual context I’m after; I want to establish a foundation of things we agree are given, and make my case from there. I also tend to use these questions to try to maintain a fact-driven (or perhaps “agreement-driven” is more appropriate) discussion. This is likely something I’ve developed after working in team where the majority of the members had strong personalities and opinions, and the meetings were often not for the timid. Keeping it focused on the facts/agreements helped keep it peaceful.
After reading the article, I’m not entirely persuaded that this question-answer-question approach is inheritly bad (the article does state that all but “The Enemy” are trying to help, albeit via micromanaging), but I agree it could be rather annoying to some personality types. If I know what I recommend, maybe I should just say it. But then, perhaps in asking my questions I’ll get an answer I didn’t expect, and maybe we’ll go down a road neither I or my colleague had considered. Like everything it’s situationally-based, and probably a good idea to adjust your management (or giving-advice) style based on who you’re dealing with.
Your turn: which panic-mode management type are you? Which type is your boss? (don’t get yourself dooced, though)
Also, if you are “The Illuminator” type described in the entry, how do you gently steer your colleague/subordinate toward making the right decision(s)?
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I was horrible in crisis situations when I was younger. I was once in a small house where the bathroom caught fire and instead of attempting to quell the actual fire, I raced over to the MOST DANGEROUS thing in the situation: the blaring smoke alarm. I proceeded to beat that damn alarm into submission, screaming like a madman, whilst my friends to care of the other, minor problem (the FIRE).
@Graham: That’s awesome. I think of the types Rand wrote about, you’re closest to the Randomizer, cause attacking the alarm is pretty random.