I want to ask how people have dealt with a manager who is just bad at managing people. Not someone that’s a jerk, but rather someone with poor ability to delegate and not well attuned to interpersonal dynamics?<p>How have you managed up in the past?
I've often found that when people complain about a manager not being attuned to interposal dynamics it's because there is an issue below the the surface of the team that isn't easily seen and not being communicated.<p>As a manager, I've been in situations where something bad has happened for months that was completely outside of my view. I had absolutely no visibility. Nobody was telling me anything.<p>The best way to manage up is to directly tell me what is going on.<p>Sometimes people try and make little off hand jokes or passive aggressively and indirectly include a cryptic sentence in an email or a standup. "Jim and Georgia are handling the unit tests, but you know how they've been, haha..."<p>I follow up and people will say something like "oh they've had a disagreement over types of tests" and no one will tell me there have been bitter feuds at every meeting for half a year. Jim and Georgia both say nothing, the team won't say anything, and then somebody on Hacker News says I'm incompetent and not attuned to interpersonal dynamics. ;)<p>This isn't a specific example from experience but a hypothetical to give you some idea of what the bad manager could be working with.<p>Delegation gets tricky too. Although I won't code or do technical individual contributor work I won't delegate other tasks because I perceive you as being busy enough already.
You know how smart the average person is? Consider that half of the population is less smart than that.<p>Having said that, who's to say that you are not the one that doesn't know how to follow a leader?<p>What I'm trying to say is that unless you have tried EVERYTHING you could to make things better, including helping your manager or at least communicating with them in all possible ways, it is not productive to call your manager incompetent.<p>We tend to think that everybody thinks like we do. They don't. That things are obvious and self evident. They aren't.<p>The best advice I can give you, if you really want to make the situation better is to get down from your high horse and work together with your manager to improve the situation. It won't be fast or easy, but it's the right thing to do.<p>If you tried all the above and it still didn't work. Them there is nothing left to do other than look for another manager or job.<p>If you want advice to a specific situation, please be specific in your question and you might receive some helpful answers.
You got a few choices:<p>1. Get a new job. Market is fantastic.
2. Step up and run the team for him.<p>I've done both in my past, both worked out well for me. My old boss still pings me from time to time for job offers, etc..
I did what others weren't willing to do:<p>I helped him.<p>Instead of waiting him burn.
I stepped in and really helped him.<p>At first he was afraid of some backstabbing from me.<p>Then once we trust we cleared all problems, upgrade whole structure and finished a year long project.<p>We did discuss, argue but once we cool off. We did get out to drink coffee as good friends then get back to work.<p>Tl Dr -> Help him or get out.<p>Don't be passive.<p>Ps. My old boss had lost his mother and was not coping well. Inviting him to lunch and coffee breaks helped a long way.
doesn't sound like much of a problem to me.<p>i don't think i've ever really had a bad manager who wasn't also an asshole.<p>but if i was in that position, i might ping him/her on the low in private, just casually, not necessarily in the scrum/in front of the whole group.<p>"Hi Bob/bi, on that new feature, did you want me to get an estimate of how long it might take to do before we promise that it will be delivered tomorrow? I'd be happy to do that now, and then going forward for any other big features related to my area of expertise."<p>just a bad example.
I'm such a manager. Did nothing :)<p>Try to see why this happening. May be there is much more behind that, then you think (to much work, to much
..)<p>And in the end, suggestions helps and self organizing is possible too