Do you have the authority of a manager?
19 May 2009
Read by 2030 persons
Autonomy of decision, level of responsibility, relationship with your superiors... Take stock of your situation in terms of authority, with this excerpt from "Develop your manager's authority" published by L'Entreprise.
Examining your own situation, in terms of authority, at work or in the association in which you hold a management position, allows you to know where you are starting from.
Examine the nature, extent and quality of the mandate entrusted to you by the organization that uses your services, but also your own daily relationships with higher authority.
The mandate you receive from the organization that pays you, that expects you to exercise authority is a contract, an element of the framework of authority.
Check the quality of your manager/responsible mandate
Your contract becomes the mechanical source of your authority. Its solidity depends essentially on four parameters:
Legality
You will only exercise authority healthily within the framework of a mandate that respects the laws. Any exercise of authority that violates the laws undermines authority, because any illegal behavior of the superior "authorizes" illegal behavior of the collaborators.
The manager who uses the company's resources for their personal needs will not be surprised to see another rule violated by their collaborators. This is not a question of morals, but a simple question of efficiency. The manager, who accepts a mandate whose execution involves a transgression or misappropriation of laws, therefore starts, whatever their team, with a serious handicap in terms of authority.
Extent
In terms of authority, this is the definition of the perimeter in which you have the competence to decide, of all the decisions that you "can and must" take without first referring to your hierarchy. This is not about the technical mastery of the subject, but about the boundary between what it is your responsibility to decide and what others must decide.
The clarity of the boundaries of the mandate and their adequacy to your objectives count more than the raw extent. The contours of the mandate are the delimitation of a territory beyond which one is "protected" by one's superiors, and within which one has "permission" to take all initiatives. The firmness of the contour makes it possible to develop the "power", within the mandate.
Fair compensation
Although it is extremely difficult to assess the fair remuneration for a given responsibility, it is advisable to ensure the coherence between the extent of the mandate, the scale of the decisions taken, and the remuneration offered by the structure.
He who decides far below his salary (for example, a big boss who would decide the color of the sanitary facilities) loses a little of his authority in the process. He who decides far beyond his remuneration (operational manager making decisions with strategic impact) exposes himself to errors of judgment and challenges.
Bilateral consent
One sometimes accepts a mission with some reluctance, one sometimes delegates a task with some doubts. Each of these hesitations and each of these doubts parasitize the solidity of the mandate and therefore the authority of the one who exercises it.
It is not a question of seeking perfect agreement, but of assessing whether the degree of these doubts and hesitations is sufficiently minor to be neglected.
What relationship with your superiors on a daily basis?
Your way of interacting with your hierarchical or functional superiors will have an impact on your authority. The quality of your mandate will depend on your ability to interact with the higher level and the quality of your mandate depends on part of your authority over your troops. In addition, the way you will use to influence your boss will be a model for your collaborators facing you.
Influencing one's boss... the idea may seem subversive. And yet, to correctly fulfill one's mission, it is sometimes necessary to have some influence on one's boss. I use the verb "influence" for healthy and adequate forms of action on the other. When the action on the other (in this case, his boss) is not explicit and cannot be clearly connected to the interest of the mission, the company, the team, etc., but is hidden or linked to personal motives, then I use the term "manipulate".
Examples of situations:
-Your boss is overwhelmed, but you absolutely need some of his time.
-You realize, afterwards, that a mission he entrusted you with is not clear enough for you.
In these two cases, it is legitimate that you exercise a form of influence on your superior.
You will find in the box modalities and points of view on the "healthy" relationship with superior hierarchical authority. You can identify those that you already have in your relational repertoire with your (or your) boss(es), and those that you could test.
Pseudo-project manager
A project manager or functional manager without delegated authority is in fact only a "process facilitator" and cannot be held to the same results as a real project manager.
Subordinate-superior relationships are often the place of expectations and fusional behaviors, in which one "expects" the other to guess our need, where one sometimes sincerely believes to have clearly asked for it, while one has only suggested in a subliminal way, where one resists the idea of asking for something that seems obvious.
Business leader
If you are a business leader and capital holder, the extent of your authority is great and, however, still has limits: the law, good practices in terms of competition, the contracts of your collaborators!
However, responsibility, in a symbiotic relationship, is bilateral: the superior rarely checks the real needs of his collaborator and the collaborator, for his part, does not clearly expose his needs. Here, we are temporarily focused on yourself as a collaborator, in relation to your hierarchy, your management committee, your board of directors, etc.
It is above all a question of:
-not expecting everything from him, accepting that this person or this instance has its limits;
-recognizing that in the request/response interaction, things begin with a request, and recognizing that any request is an attempt to influence.
> Some examples of behaviors to adopt to obtain something from your superior while remaining respectful:
-Have realistic expectations, accept its limits.
-Ask directly for what you need, accepting in advance that the answer may be negative.
-Ask him how you should go about having an impact on him? (his own "instruction manual").
-Ask when the need is flagrant.
-Anticipate requests.
-Give him information about your own experience of the situation.
If you are clear, in this area, with your own hierarchy, you increase the chances that your collaborators will also treat you with respect, without magical expectation.
Isabelle Harlé
Published on October 12, 2007
Posted online on May 21, 2009
lentreprise.com
Examining your own situation, in terms of authority, at work or in the association in which you hold a management position, allows you to know where you are starting from.
Examine the nature, extent and quality of the mandate entrusted to you by the organization that uses your services, but also your own daily relationships with higher authority.
The mandate you receive from the organization that pays you, that expects you to exercise authority is a contract, an element of the framework of authority.
Check the quality of your manager/responsible mandate
Your contract becomes the mechanical source of your authority. Its solidity depends essentially on four parameters:
Legality
You will only exercise authority healthily within the framework of a mandate that respects the laws. Any exercise of authority that violates the laws undermines authority, because any illegal behavior of the superior "authorizes" illegal behavior of the collaborators.
The manager who uses the company's resources for their personal needs will not be surprised to see another rule violated by their collaborators. This is not a question of morals, but a simple question of efficiency. The manager, who accepts a mandate whose execution involves a transgression or misappropriation of laws, therefore starts, whatever their team, with a serious handicap in terms of authority.
Extent
In terms of authority, this is the definition of the perimeter in which you have the competence to decide, of all the decisions that you "can and must" take without first referring to your hierarchy. This is not about the technical mastery of the subject, but about the boundary between what it is your responsibility to decide and what others must decide.
The clarity of the boundaries of the mandate and their adequacy to your objectives count more than the raw extent. The contours of the mandate are the delimitation of a territory beyond which one is "protected" by one's superiors, and within which one has "permission" to take all initiatives. The firmness of the contour makes it possible to develop the "power", within the mandate.
Fair compensation
Although it is extremely difficult to assess the fair remuneration for a given responsibility, it is advisable to ensure the coherence between the extent of the mandate, the scale of the decisions taken, and the remuneration offered by the structure.
He who decides far below his salary (for example, a big boss who would decide the color of the sanitary facilities) loses a little of his authority in the process. He who decides far beyond his remuneration (operational manager making decisions with strategic impact) exposes himself to errors of judgment and challenges.
Bilateral consent
One sometimes accepts a mission with some reluctance, one sometimes delegates a task with some doubts. Each of these hesitations and each of these doubts parasitize the solidity of the mandate and therefore the authority of the one who exercises it.
It is not a question of seeking perfect agreement, but of assessing whether the degree of these doubts and hesitations is sufficiently minor to be neglected.
What relationship with your superiors on a daily basis?
Your way of interacting with your hierarchical or functional superiors will have an impact on your authority. The quality of your mandate will depend on your ability to interact with the higher level and the quality of your mandate depends on part of your authority over your troops. In addition, the way you will use to influence your boss will be a model for your collaborators facing you.
Influencing one's boss... the idea may seem subversive. And yet, to correctly fulfill one's mission, it is sometimes necessary to have some influence on one's boss. I use the verb "influence" for healthy and adequate forms of action on the other. When the action on the other (in this case, his boss) is not explicit and cannot be clearly connected to the interest of the mission, the company, the team, etc., but is hidden or linked to personal motives, then I use the term "manipulate".
Examples of situations:
-Your boss is overwhelmed, but you absolutely need some of his time.
-You realize, afterwards, that a mission he entrusted you with is not clear enough for you.
In these two cases, it is legitimate that you exercise a form of influence on your superior.
You will find in the box modalities and points of view on the "healthy" relationship with superior hierarchical authority. You can identify those that you already have in your relational repertoire with your (or your) boss(es), and those that you could test.
Pseudo-project manager
A project manager or functional manager without delegated authority is in fact only a "process facilitator" and cannot be held to the same results as a real project manager.
Subordinate-superior relationships are often the place of expectations and fusional behaviors, in which one "expects" the other to guess our need, where one sometimes sincerely believes to have clearly asked for it, while one has only suggested in a subliminal way, where one resists the idea of asking for something that seems obvious.
Business leader
If you are a business leader and capital holder, the extent of your authority is great and, however, still has limits: the law, good practices in terms of competition, the contracts of your collaborators!
However, responsibility, in a symbiotic relationship, is bilateral: the superior rarely checks the real needs of his collaborator and the collaborator, for his part, does not clearly expose his needs. Here, we are temporarily focused on yourself as a collaborator, in relation to your hierarchy, your management committee, your board of directors, etc.
It is above all a question of:
-not expecting everything from him, accepting that this person or this instance has its limits;
-recognizing that in the request/response interaction, things begin with a request, and recognizing that any request is an attempt to influence.
> Some examples of behaviors to adopt to obtain something from your superior while remaining respectful:
-Have realistic expectations, accept its limits.
-Ask directly for what you need, accepting in advance that the answer may be negative.
-Ask him how you should go about having an impact on him? (his own "instruction manual").
-Ask when the need is flagrant.
-Anticipate requests.
-Give him information about your own experience of the situation.
If you are clear, in this area, with your own hierarchy, you increase the chances that your collaborators will also treat you with respect, without magical expectation.
Isabelle Harlé
Published on October 12, 2007
Posted online on May 21, 2009
lentreprise.com
