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Concerned your boss isn't a technical powerhouse

Written by Preston Chandler | Jun 4, 2024 8:06:01 PM

 

Concerned your boss isn't a technically excellent leadership guru unicorn? Don't be. 

In technical professions, it is normal to have bosses who came up through a technical track. At some point they are promoted to lead others... often without significant skill, training, or experience. Many are promoted to leadership because they were good technically and, while it is possible to find the unicorn, it isn't reasonable to expect this to happen regularly. The bottom line is that you will likely have to work for someone who has less leadership skill, training or experience than you do... and that's fine. Here are some ways to deal with it: 

First, remember that being the subordinate does not mean that you are less experienced or that your boss should be more adept than you are. Everyone is growing in their career and your boss just may be earlier in their leadership career than you are in your technical career. You can be an expert at what you do and allow your boss to be an expert at what they do. 

Second, many fail to recognize that at least as much training and experience is required to be a good manager as to be a good technologist. We often make the assumption that "anyone can manage", but expect people to have multiple years of experience and/or technical degrees in order to be an engineer. Make sure to give new leaders the time, training and experience that they need to become proficient. 

Third, you don't have to be a great leader to recognize a great leader... or a bad one. You may have decades of experience with both good, and bad, bosses. You've seen things that work, and things that don't. However, the leaders themselves rarely have the luxury of other leaders seeing them lead and correcting their mistakes. On the other hand, a leader's subordinates get to witness their attempts at leadership on a daily basis. Because of this, some of the greatest moments of progression in my career have been when my subordinates were willing to be open and honest about my performance. 

Note here: there is a fine line between being overly critical and supporting your boss by giving honest feedback. If you can manage to not cross the line, then you can have a phenomenal impact. Going over the line might get you labeled as a rebel and difficult to work with. 

Lastly, if you don't like leading people then don't do it. You'll only make yourself and your subordinates miserable. There are other ways to grow your career. That said, my opinion is that to grow any career you need to be able to lead. It may be leading technology or clients or ideas instead of people, but it is still leading.