I have a guest blog to share about the impact managers can have on their employees and some potential unintended consequences. Enjoy!
– Coach Wolfgang

Some days I feel like I have a very good boss. He impresses me with his initiative and is very focused on getting the job done. He’s a good leader and gets a lot more accomplished than his peers under the same Vice President. Unfortunately, that’s not enough for me to love my job.

In fact, my boss does a lot of things that make it difficult for me to not only love my job but also strive to improve my career at the company. When they happen I lose my enthusiasm for the day and often times I start day dreaming about a better job. When I have a day full of these things, then I pull up some job search websites and start searching.

Here are 10 ways my manager is pushing me to reevaluate my position: career vs. job? Am I here for a paycheck until I find a better opportunity or is there a long-term career for me here?

• Our one-on-one weekly meetings with me consist mostly of you giving out new tasks
• Assign me mostly projects that you don’t like or don’t want to do
• Rarely address my career development and assume that I love what I do
• You give verbal accolades but rarely give substantive awards or raises
• Don’t take the time to understand what my day-to-day looks like
• Don’t know how many hours I am working and if I am feeling stressed out by my workload
• Assume that I like all tasks/projects equally
• You expect me to answer “yes” to everything you ask
• Don’t demonstrate that you are working just as hard
• Think I am being lazy when I don’t deliver a task on time or don’t do it the way you wanted

As employees, we have a role in this too. We need to voice our concerns to our manager and have honest conversations. If we aren’t getting what we need, we do need to speak up. As a people manager, consider how many of these you are guilty of. Honestly, that list isn’t too hard to turn around. If you can make these changes, you’ll have me working my tail off and excited about working for you. Plus, I’ll stop looking at job search sites.