You will be able to find out your manager's priorities and pressures, and how they like to work.
Before your next conversation with your manager, write one sentence on what they are measured on this year and another on what worries them most right now. If either sentence is a guess, you are setting your team's priorities partly blind. Your manager is judged on something, and their goals and the pressure from above shape what they care about, what worries them and what they will notice about your team.
New managers often manage their team carefully and their own manager hardly at all. The relationship with your own manager strongly shapes how much you can do for your team.
Wei Ling is a new manager running a team. Three months into the role, she sent her manager, Daniel, a detailed two-page update on her team's progress. Daniel replied in one line: "Thanks, can we discuss the Changi renewal?" She had not mentioned the Changi renewal because she didn't know it was on his mind. Daniel's boss had been asking him about it for a week.
She realised she had been managing her team carefully and Daniel hardly at all. Her relationship with him had got the least thought of any, yet it shaped most how much she could do for her team.
She asked Daniel about his goals. He said client retention was his main measure, and that two of the largest accounts, including Changi, were up for renewal in the next six months. That changed how she saw her manager charter from Lesson 1.4, "Write your first-90-days manager charter". Her team's outcomes on report timeliness and escalations mattered to Daniel because they fed directly into renewals. She added a line on renewal readiness to her team's goals.
You can ask your own manager the same way. Ask what they are measured on this year, what worries them most right now, and what a good year for your team looks like from where they sit. Most managers are pleased to be asked, and few of their reports ever ask. Use the answers to adjust your team's priorities and goals, as Wei Ling did with her charter.
Wei Ling also found out that her two-page update was well written and thorough, but Daniel reads updates on his phone between meetings and wanted five lines. Managers differ here. Some want written updates to read when they have time, and others prefer a quick conversation. Some want detail, others want just the headline and will ask if they need more. Some want a weekly summary, others want to hear from you only when something changes. No preference is right or wrong, but getting it wrong wastes both people's time.
Ask early: written or spoken, detail or summary, how often, and the best way to reach them for something urgent. The update habits you used as a team member with your own manager still apply now that you manage people, with higher stakes. Lesson 3.1, "What your manager actually wants from an update", and Lesson 3.3, "Agree how and when you update your manager", both in the course "Communicate at work", cover what goes in those updates and their rhythm.
Wei Ling and Daniel now meet every two weeks for 30 minutes, with a five-line written update on the other weeks. Daniel hears about problems before his boss does, and Wei Ling knows what he is worried about before it reaches her team.
In Lesson 3.2, "Match your involvement to their experience", you set authority levels for your team. The same levels apply upward. Upward authority levels are the three kinds of decision you agree with your manager: ones you can make alone, ones your manager wants to be told about afterwards, and ones they want to be consulted on first.
Most new managers never ask about this, so they guess. If you guess too cautiously, you bring every small decision upward, which makes you look unsure. If you guess too boldly, you make a call your manager expected to hear about first, which damages trust.
Ask about specific kinds of decision. For example, ask whether you can:
approve leave without checking move workload between team members agree a deadline extension with a client spend from the team budget, and up to what amount change a team process
Write the answers down and revisit them after a few months, because the boundaries usually widen as trust builds.
The most important rule with your manager is no surprises: bad news should reach your manager from you, early, before it reaches them any other way. A manager who hears about a problem from you, with time to act, can help. A manager who hears about it from their own boss or from an angry client feels blindsided. How small the problem was matters little. What they remember is that you knew and they didn't.
Tell your manager as soon as you know enough to describe the problem. You do not need the full solution first. A good heads-up says what the problem is, why it happened, what you have already done and when it will be fixed. For example: "Heads-up: the Tan & Co weekly report will be a day late because of a data problem on their side. I've told the client, and the report will go out tomorrow by noon." That message takes thirty seconds to send. Bigger problems where you need a decision from your manager are covered in Lesson 8.3, "Bring problems with options".
Before your next meeting with your own manager, write the questions you need answered about their priorities, their preferences and what you can decide alone.
Write five questions for your manager about their priorities, preferences and decision rights. Ask them in your next meeting.
Junxiong-WFG Organisation is an authorised representative of AIA Financial Advisers Private Limited (Reg. No. 201715016G).