Managing a micro-manager

It's frustrating to have a client, boss, or even co-worker attempt to micro-manage you. We share some tips on how to make the working relationship better.

• (00:00) - Uncomfortable projects and clients
• (02:45) - Ask them directly "what's up"
• (05:00) - Understand what they want from you
• (07:00) - Let's role play
• (10:30) - The extra work is worth it
• (11:42) - Silly bit

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Creators & Guests

Host

Aaron Saray

Host

Joel Clermont

What is No Compromises?

Two seasoned salty programming veterans talk best practices based on years of working with Laravel SaaS teams.

Joel Clermont (00:00):
Welcome to No Compromises, a peek into the mind of two old web devs who have seen some things. This is Joel.

Aaron Saray (00:08):
And this Aaron.

Joel Clermont (00:15):
We enjoy the type of work we do now but every once in a while, and I'm thinking back, I don't have to go back that far to think of situations, projects, clients that just... it felt like there was friction. It felt like maybe it was a lack of trust or respect from them or maybe it was their need to micromanage or tell people what to do. But there is this constant friction of having to explain things or having to justify things, or having to just be in meetings to talk through things when I could have been doing the work. I know you can relate to this, Aaron, and I know it's something we want to talk about today. Because it's not unique whether you're in a company or working for yourself with clients. This sort of scenario comes up from time to time.

Aaron Saray (01:02):
A good way to kind of make this more general is, after you've been developing for a while, you know that you have more to learn, you know you could be better-

Joel Clermont (01:11):
Sure.

Aaron Saray (01:11):
... but you also know what you're doing. You know how to solve problems, you know how to program things. Maybe not the best but you can solve people's problems. And it's a confidence, not a cockiness, so you have this attitude and then people keep looking over your shoulder or asking you for very, very specific progress reports. Or you just feel like someone you're working with, maybe even your coworker, is bossy. They're like, "No, you have to use this code standard," and, "You're not doing it right," or whatever. And that can be a really frustrating sort of experience to be part of.

Joel Clermont (01:47):
Yeah, it kind of sucks the air out of the life of a project. It takes the fun out of it and it's also not efficient, it's frustrating for that reason too. It's wasting time.

Aaron Saray (01:58):
Right. Especially when you think about it that if you're going to work for, let's just say, a client they've spent their life or career or whatever, I'm oversimplifying it, but being good at what they do in their business realm. And you spent yours being good at what you are doing and then they kind of try to do what they're doing in their regular business but also jump into your world and kind of control you as well. And you're like, "How could you possibly be any good at controlling me or helping me if you've only spent a year in this space where I've spent five?" or something like that. So you start to see this disconnect. And I think you kind of hit it right on the head when you first started out. You kind of gave away some of the topic, which is some of these things come from a lack of trust, a lack of respect or misaligned expectations.

Joel Clermont (02:43):
Okay.

Aaron Saray (02:44):
Those are some really big things to talk about but I think we can narrow this down to a very specific step that you can take as a developer in these situations.

Joel Clermont (02:56):
Let's hear it. I love this sort of advice.

Aaron Saray (02:59):
Okay. It's going to be way too simple and you're not going to like it.

Joel Clermont (03:03):
Oh, I already do like it.

Aaron Saray (03:04):
Okay. Ask them what's up.

Joel Clermont (03:08):
Okay, I don't like that.

Aaron Saray (03:09):
No. When we come to this there's some things like trust or respect that are a little bit more difficult. But let's just focus on the third one, which is more expectations. I think those kind of build to the rest, is they have a certain set of expectations and those expectations are built from their own silo of experience. Think about it, if you've worked with multiple businesses or multiple clients, even if you work for our company right now you've probably at least worked for another company or two. And every time you go to those different companies, they have different ways of doing things.

Joel Clermont (03:44):
Sure.

Aaron Saray (03:44):
One of the things you have to keep in mind is, you get to experience doing things differently all the time but that person who is in that company kind of only knows what they know from that company and their experiences in that specific silo. So there's a lot that you may not know that they've experienced that kind of shapes their expectations of how they're going to work with you. We've worked with clients that have had developers who just disappeared, we've worked with clients that have worked with developers who maybe took on too much. They said they could do something and turns out they can't. And what are you going to do? You can't get back the money, you spent it on rent. So they just kind of muscle through it. Who wants to admit that, "I don't actually know how to do this?"

Joel Clermont (04:28):
No.

Aaron Saray (04:28):
How scary, right?

Joel Clermont (04:30):
Right, yeah. We're kind of coming into this situation and it's not a pleasant one for them either.

Aaron Saray (04:37):
Yeah. So they have all these different experiences and so you come up and you say, "Hey, I have sold myself just everyone else has sold themselves to you, just treat me differently." They don't know how to.

Joel Clermont (04:49):
Sure.

Aaron Saray (04:49):
When you start seeing these situations, you can kind of start to see how you are unique. And I know you are, the listeners, developers, whatever, and so is the business. So each time you come together, even though you've made a relationship you have to do the next step, which is to work through the expectations. So what is it that you want from me? And be certain to ask that often. Because a lot of times we only ask that when we first join the project or if we just get hired, or whatever. But it's almost like a reverse review if you think about it that way. You know, you get reviewed every six months or a year, you should be going to your boss or to the bossy person if they're even a coworker, and be like, "What is it that you're expecting from me? I want to be better and I want to make it easier for you because clearly you don't really like having to tell me everything. Do you? That's not what you want to spend your time doing."

Joel Clermont (05:43):
Just real quick. It's not a confrontational question. You're not like, "Well, what do you expect?"

Aaron Saray (05:51):
No.

Joel Clermont (05:51):
It's literally like, "Hey, I'm getting a vibe, something's not right. What is it that you're actually looking for that I'm not doing now?" That how you approach it?

Aaron Saray (05:58):
Right.

Joel Clermont (05:58):
Okay.

Aaron Saray (05:59):
And it's because, as I've said many times, different times too, is we're in a support industry, we support business. Even though we can create stuff that businesses can't maybe themselves with their own hands and all that kind of stuff, we're still there to support them. They do the business of some other world and then we kind of build things for them to continue to do that. So we should constantly be looking at it, it's like, "How can we support this business a different way?" With that mindset, that's what you ask them. You say, "Hey, obviously I want to make your life better because programming is support and that's who I am and I actually really enjoy that. Okay? So what is it that I'm doing wrong or that you don't feel that you're getting, that you want to check in with me every day or every couple hours?" or whatever.

Joel Clermont (06:47):
Oh, yeah.

Aaron Saray (06:48):
That's a really strong, a really amazing question to ask. I know when we give these sort of tips we're trying to hit one, two, and three, but really this is the only one. It's just ask.

Joel Clermont (07:03):
And what would you do if they don't have a concrete answer? Are you expecting them to consciously know what they want? Or is it possible they don't know what they're want and that's part of their insecurity coming through in how they're managing you?

Aaron Saray (07:16):
Well, I think that's kind of why I said you can't really do the next steps, you have to kind of feel that out. That's tough depending on the level of empathy that you've practised, what you have, all those different things. But still, when you ask them, you can kind of get an insight. Even if we did a kind of a little mini role play here, why don't you play the role of me asking the question?

Joel Clermont (07:37):
Wait, what?

Aaron Saray (07:38):
I'm a boss that seems to be asking you every two hours. "What's up?"

Joel Clermont (07:42):
"Hey, Aaron, I noticed you're checking in a lot. Is there something you expect of me that I'm not doing? Could I do better at?"

Aaron Saray (07:49):
"Well, just to do your job."

Joel Clermont (07:51):
"Okay. Thanks, see you." See that's what I'm talking about. Just to do your job then push back and be a little more specific.

Aaron Saray (08:00):
Yeah, okay. Your next step is like, "I obviously want to do my job. I want to work here, I want to do this." By the way, if you don't then you need to get out.

Joel Clermont (08:11):
Okay. Good point.

Aaron Saray (08:12):
But otherwise, you want to be here. You're like, "Okay. I think I'm doing my job. I'm clearly not according to you, which is sad and I want to fix that. What specific thing can I change next week? Just one to see if we can make this a little bit easier."

Joel Clermont (08:31):
Okay. You're scoping it down.

Aaron Saray (08:32):
Yeah. And they're going to say, "Well, I need you to send me an email every day of what you're working on." And then you can say something like, "Okay. So if I sent you an email in the morning and an email at the end of the day saying what I'm planning on doing and what I did, do you think that that would make you more comfortable knowing that you could depend on those and that you wouldn't have to reach out to me every two or three hours?" "Well, sometimes I need something specific." "I understand that. But in general, is that the kind of communication you need?"

Joel Clermont (09:00):
Okay.

Aaron Saray (09:00):
Then you find that out and you start to change these things. You change and you knock them sort of out of the way and you figure out like, "Okay, now I've done this." Maybe you get into that thing and that's not sustainable either. But you start to say okay... We're going to call this boss Brian.

Joel Clermont (09:16):
Hey, Brian.

Aaron Saray (09:17):
Next, say sometime maybe next review or like, "Hey, I want to check in. We've been doing this new system for a month. I want to see if we can make it even better for you because I know you get a lot of emails. What if I sent you an email every morning that had a summary of what I did yesterday and what I'm going to do today?" Would that be useful?

Joel Clermont (09:35):
Dropping the two a day down to one a day.

Aaron Saray (09:38):
Yeah. Then you start to move it on and you be like, "Okay. So a lot of times I use tickets and GitHub to show what I'm working on, I know that can be really overwhelming when there's a lot of different things and different tags and all that kind of stuff. Would it make sense if I made a different sort of dashboard for you or found a product that can make a different dashboard that shows you different things?" Because really what they're probably concerned about is they either don't know how to tell you what they want or they don't know if you're doing the work or they've been burned before and they want to make sure they don't get burned again. But they don't know why they were burned before so they're putting all the possible reasons on you, and so that makes it really tough for you.

Joel Clermont (10:18):
That's too empathetic for me, I'll have to think about that. Because as you're going through that, on the one hand, like, "Okay, I could see how this would work." On the other hand, I'm like, "Man, this seems like a lot of work. Like I'm babysitting this person." But it's in the spirit of improving the relationship and ultimately getting what you want and making the situation better. If you have to put in a little bit of work, it's worth it.

Aaron Saray (10:41):
Well, I want to challenge that real quick before we wrap up. You know, it seems I'm babysitting this person. Who on Earth promised you that your boss was going to be more developed and a better person than you?

Joel Clermont (10:54):
Hmm. It would be nice, but you're right. There's no guarantee of that.

Aaron Saray (10:59):
Yeah, there's no guarantee. So sometimes you have to do the work. If you have children or whatever, you don't look at them and say, "Oh, what's wrong with you? Why can't you do calculus right away?" You kind of have to teach them, but they have their own thought process. So you try to teach them in sort of a way that makes sense for them but also that you get the process that you need involved, which is them learning calculus. Same thing with a boss. If you identify, "Hey, this boss doesn't seem to be communicating the best way because we're having friction. So that could be me, that could be them. But why don't I make myself better by asking these questions and then we'll see if they can grow too?"

Joel Clermont (11:33):
So at least I can secretly feel superior about this, is what you're saying,

Aaron Saray (11:36):
Yeah, a little bit.

Joel Clermont (11:37):
Okay, I can live with that.
You've probably heard the common expression, never judge a book by its cover, right?

Aaron Saray (11:50):
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Joel Clermont (11:50):
We all hear that. Can you think of any situations where it actually is okay to judge a book by its cover? Because I have one in mind, but I want to explore the brain of Aaron before we give my specific example.

Aaron Saray (12:05):
I mean, besides finding books in the bookstore?

Joel Clermont (12:09):
Okay. If we get hyper-literal, then it's okay.

Aaron Saray (12:12):
Yeah, because how else are you supposed to judge a book except by the stuff that's on the cover? I guess you could read it.

Joel Clermont (12:18):
You could be like me when I was a broke teenager and I would go to Barnes and Noble and sit there and just read the book. That's what you're saying. Not buy it, just read it.

Aaron Saray (12:25):
Yeah.

Joel Clermont (12:25):
No here's the one: I was driving down the road and there was a sign in front of a commercial building that it was for sale or for lease or whatever. And the contact information was an email address but it was @aol.com and I'm like, "Do I really want to work with a real estate agent that has an aol.com address?" Then I'm like, "Am I judging a book by its cover? Or am I listening to an important signal from my gut here?" What do you think?

Aaron Saray (12:56):
Oh, man. Yeah, I think I can say that I have definitely seen that or a Comcast email or whatever, and you've been like, "Wow, whatever." But on the flip side, I guess what do I want? Do I want someone who's really good at being a realtor and maybe sucks at technology? Or do I want someone who is good at technology like me and probably isn't as great of a realtor then? Maybe when someone has a Comcast or an AOL email, they're on the newest stuff because those came out way back in the day. So they were an early adopter of tech and then they just decide that, "You know what? I'm going to focus on my niche, which is my business. And not following the most recent trends of how the internet works."

Joel Clermont (13:41):
Well, you know the one fun thing could be like, if you did work with them, you would know every time you sent them an email. They'd hear, "You've got mail."

Aaron Saray (13:55):
Sometimes you have a vision in your head and you know what you want, but you just didn't know how to describe it or what you can do to get there.

Joel Clermont (14:01):
Well, we can help. Head over to nocompromises.io and give us a call.