The Impacts of Micro-Managing

When you are a brand-new employee a well-trained micro-manager can save you a lot of pain and suffering in business. However, if you are experienced and know what you are doing, your work life can suffer so much. We work on defining when micro-managing is needed and when it is not.

Is managing always needed? Yes, but some managers just go overboard with it.

The Positive Impacts of Micro-Managing

Micro-managing is a learned skill and comes down to a lot of communication skills at its basic level. Micro-managers have their place in the workforce, and everyone should understand the positives that come out of them because they are usually tarnished as bad.

Positive impacts of micro-managing that they bring if conducted properly:

Great for new employees learning tasks
A detailed approach to business
Great meeting facilitators
Detailed in their job role and can train easily
They take pride and care about others
Gives people a peace of mind that someone is looking out for them

There is always a fine line when managing people and managers need to understand when they can let people do their own thing, and this is where it can get messy. It works the same way with leadership. There is always a fine line in business and how you communicate with staff. The keyword here is communication.

The Negative Impacts of Micro-Managing

This is what most people think about when they hear about micro-managers. Our history tells us that a lot of managers are put in positions of seniority without the proper training and as a result try and keep a handle on everything. This is where they fail and again it is communication.

The negative side of micro-managing is listed through the following:

Delegation – because they have not truly let go of their job that they are good at, they think no one else can do it the same or as good.
Decision Making – staff feel like they cannot do anything right and are not allowed to make mistakes on their own. Mistakes are teachers in life and business. Micro-managers should allow it to happen within reason. Again, that fine line!
Complain – they will complain often because people are not doing what they ask them to do.
Knowledge Flow – because they can always supposedly do it better, they neglect on passing along their knowledge to other staff
Lag – projects don’t get completed on time, because micro-managers didn’t give people the ability to perform
Delivery – they are never happy with how things turned out and think they could have done better
Turnover – people quit managers, not businesses!
Anxiety – when managers look over shoulders too much, it gives staff members high anxiety.

Fortunately, there are ways to work with micro-managers and coming up with better plans. The word again is communication!

What to Do with Micro-Managers

Micro-managers have and will be a part of the business for many, many years to come. There is a right way and wrong way to approach these types of managers if they are negatively impacting your job function. It starts with a conversation with your Human Resources Department and moves on from there.

Some insights for micro-managers are the following:

Stop thinking so highly of yourself – when you talk with HR, explain yourself and why you feel your job is being excessively managed. Then speak with the manager about what is going on and the impacts it is having on you as a valued staff member.
Let go – managers need to understand for them to accel at a company, they must delegate effectively and trust people. Set up weekly meetings to get the level of detail you need. If you are not able to train another staff member in your past job function, then you don’t know your job well enough either. You are just as much to blame.
Lead – manage with purpose and a why. Tell people what you want them to do and let them perform. Regular follow-ups will let you know what you need to do next.
Perform – if you train, manage and lead a team effectively, you are going to win!

Management can take on varying levels and can impact staff positively and negatively. Future to Now Consulting can help, please reach out to us and our team of business co nsultants would be happy to help.