I've Had More Management Training Than My Boss-- Help! (Ask Christa! S6E67)

Introduction

Hi everyone and welcome to Ask Christa! where I answer listener questions about business challenges and workplace issues. I’m Christa Dhimo and this is episode 67 in Season SIX, which focuses on dealing with bad bosses. And since most people aren’t prepared to become a manager, any problems you have with YOUR boss is probably similar to the problems they’re having with THEIR boss, and that keeps the bad-boss cycle going.

Today’s episode is about what to do when you’ve had more management training than your boss has had. I imagine that can be really frustrating…

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Listener Question

Here’s the listener question, “I’ve had more management training than my boss, and it’s so frustrating that there are days when I want to scream. I had to take this job last year after getting laid off, and I am underemployed at two levels below  where I was a year ago. I need to support my family and we need the benefits, but there are days when I cannot possibly dumb myself down more as I watch my boss struggle with managing conflict, giving feedback, even communicating the priorities for the week. I’ve mastered being able to tune most of it out and just nod, and I’m going through the motions to be a good employee, but my head hurts every day. I had to remove any previous management experience from my resume in order to get this job. 

I don’t have a specific question; I’m just really frustrated and thought I’d send something in knowing you’ve helped others.”

First… I’m really sorry you’re dealing with this at work. It’s not just that you’ve had more management training than your boss, it’s that you’re underemployed, so my guess is that EVERYTHING you do day in and day out is work you could do in your sleep. It’s easy to feel frustrated when you feel like you have so much more to give but had to take a lower, lesser, or easier job because you have bills to pay and need the benefits.

And yes, there’s no actual question being asked, but this reminds me of episode 43 from Season 4 where a listener wrote in about how much they hated politics, and similar to this one—asked for help.

And that’s OK.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Being Underemployed

We’ll get to the dynamics of being more qualified than your boss in a few minutes. First I want to address something that might be more common than most think about, especially in the last 25 years where the economy meant highs and lows with employment: being under-employed. 

Underemployment is when an employee’s job doesn’t fully utilize their skills and abilities. Some would include education into the equation also, but not everyone’s education is aligned to their job.

There are advantages to being underemployed and there are times when that’s a strategic decision in life: for example, if your personal responsibilities mean you cannot take on a big job or cannot fully utilize your skills. Or, if the economy isn’t great and you have to take whatever work you can get, as the saying goes. Or if you’ve had high-stress jobs in the past and have decided to rachet things down for a little while and regroup—think about what else you might want to do. Some will purposefully under-employ themselves so they can still pay the bills, still get some benefits, but take a breather, too.

The DISadvantages are obvious, though, and you know how I know a lot of people are underemployed? Because half of everyone I talk to, and at least half of the questions I receive for this show, focus on feeling unfulfilled at work, knowing they are poorly utilized but too afraid to say anything, asked to do work they’ve done ten years ago, or… feeling like you can outrun everyone around you and out-manage your manager. OR… just graduating from college and having to find and take any kind of work just to get into the labor force.

Under-employment, especially if you need work for benefits, often creates its own cycle of chronic underemployment, so the additional resources for today’s episode will include resources to help with that issue because long-term, we want our listener to get a bit closer to where they probably belong, especially if they’ve had more management training than their boss. Those skills alone make our listener more competitive; remember, most managers are NOT prepared for management positions, so if you ARE… leverage that.

Running Circles Around Your Boss (and not winning)

As for the issue of having more management training than your manager, there are a few options to help you cope, and I invite everyone to offer their comments also.

First: you, and only you. Re-align your expectations so that your job simply fulfills the practicality of having a job. It sounds like that’s the sole purpose of it for now, so embrace that. In the meantime, do a good job while your there, then put all that pent up management energy you’ve been trained for to good use outside the workplace. Mentor others, create and then present management training for high school students—get them sized up to be good managers in the future. Join management groups or your local business groups. Your frustration may not go away quickly, so shift the energy into something that serves as a constructive relief valve for you.

Second, you and your company. See if there are opportunities for you to share your management training and management knowledge. Yes—I know, not all organizations are open to this, but you’d be surprised how many are. AND… it doesn’t have to be a formal training seminar. Why not get a group of people who might be interested in sharing, collectively, best management practices as a way to build a knowledge bank at work—a knowledge bank WITH others, not one you have to individually search for online. Working within a group to share management practices is a GREAT way to build management capabilities BECAUSE you are… practicing. With each other! Even TALKING about management skills gets people talking about management issues, and that’s a good way to share solutions and make them more normative.

Third, and perhaps most importantly: our listener has had more management training than their boss, but we ALL must remember that having had training doth not maketh a good manager. Management training is good for individuals to learn various skills, and if there’s a forum to practice, people get to practice also, but it’s usually for the duration of the session. Rarely is management training effective and that’s because most times the organization doesn’t live and breathe best management practices. Most times they don’t even live and breathe GOOD management practices. It’s often disparate, and team-specific or department specific, because a lot of organizations consider management training as optional and nice to have.

So… as you consider your move, show how YOUR management training can make a difference. Being an effective manager isn’t about how much training you’ve had; it’s about how you utilize the training you’ve had, and you don’t have to be a manager to apply what you’ve learned. Listening, feedback, performance coaching, prioritizing tasks, holding others accountable, communicating clear intentions with timely follow-ups, and able to regulate your emptions in times of great distress… these are the same skills that make us great team mates, too… and that’s not nothing.

Additional Resources

For your resources, located in the show notes, I’ve included a video from the Career Contessa Podcast from a year ago. It’s called, “From unemployed to underemployed: How to cope with it.” The guest is someone who was in HR for a number of years then transitioned into career coaching, and her advice is very good, spanning across different industries and different levels, although management and up is where she tends to focus. The guest talks about under-employment in different ways—including how any slowdown of pay raises within an organization sets people up to be… under-employed. 

Next up is an article from The Muse, which is a site I’ve mentioned before because all their articles offer tips for action and various links for more information, too. It’s a few years old, but still holds. It’s called, “3 Strategies for dealing when you’re Underemployed.”

Last, is ANOTHER article from The Muse—because I needed to include a resource about having more skills than your manager, and all my usuals had a paywall or required a sign up. So—thank you to The Muse. This article is called, “3 Smart steps to take if you’re more qualified than your boss.” Typical of The Muse, it’s brief, filled with resources, and easy to read.

…and I chuckled a bit that both articles from The Muse had three things in it.

I do that, too…

Wrap Up & Submitting Your Question

And there it is, Episode 67 from season six focused on Dealing with Difficult Bosses. Like and subscribe here, but also: send in your question. Go to my site, AskChrista.com, that’s Christa with a C-H and click on Submit Your Question. You’ll also see answers to other questions, listed by category and season, and every season has a theme. As always, thank you for your support. And remember, if you have a business challenge or a workplace issue—Ask Christa!