Managing Up: How New Managers Can Build a Strong Relationship with Their Boss

When I first stepped into a management role, I was so focused on managing my team that I completely neglected one of the most critical relationships for my success: the one with my own boss. I thought my job was to take direction and execute, simple as that. It took a few hard lessons to realise that managing my team was only half the battle. The other half was learning how to manage my manager. It’s a concept we call “managing up,” and it’s not about manipulation or sucking up. It’s about building a genuine partnership that helps you, your boss, and the entire organisation succeed. It’s about making your boss’s job easier, and in turn, making your own job more impactful and less stressful.

What Managing Up Really Means

Let’s get one thing straight: managing up isn’t about being a sycophant or trying to control your boss. It’s about being the most effective employee you can be. It’s the art and science of consciously working with your superior to obtain the best possible results for you, your boss, and your company. This means understanding their goals, pressures, and preferred work styles, and then adapting your own approach to align with theirs. It’s about proactively communicating, anticipating needs, and providing solutions, not just problems. When you manage up effectively, you build a relationship based on trust and mutual respect, which is the foundation of any successful professional partnership.

Early in my career at Safestore, I had a manager who was brilliant with numbers but less so with people. He was always buried in spreadsheets and reports, and his communication was often blunt and to the point. My initial instinct was to avoid him, to just get on with my work and hope for the best. But my team was struggling, and I needed his support. I realised that to get what I needed, I had to learn to speak his language. I started presenting my requests with clear data, showing the financial impact of my proposals. The change was immediate. He became my biggest advocate, not because I was brown-nosing, but because I made it easy for him to see the value in what I was doing.

The Foundations: Trust and Communication

At the heart of managing up are two fundamental pillars: trust and communication. You can’t have a strong relationship with your boss without them. Trust is earned, not given. It’s built on a foundation of reliability, honesty, and integrity. When you say you’re going to do something, you do it. When you make a mistake, you own it. When you see a problem, you raise it. I learned this lesson the hard way when I was a Branch Manager. I tried to hide a stock discrepancy, thinking I could fix it before anyone noticed. Of course, my manager found out, and the fallout was far worse than if I had just been upfront from the start. It took months to rebuild that trust, and I never made that mistake again.

Communication is the other side of the coin. It’s not just about keeping your boss in the loop; it’s about understanding how they like to receive information and adapting your style to match. Do they prefer a quick chat in the hallway or a detailed email? A formal weekly report or a running commentary on Slack? I once had a boss who was a classic extrovert. He loved to talk things through, to brainstorm and bounce ideas around. My natural tendency was to work things out on my own and then present a finished product. I had to consciously change my approach, to involve him earlier in the process. It felt unnatural at first, but it made our working relationship so much more effective. We were on the same page, and he felt more invested in my projects because he had been a part of them from the beginning.

Practical Strategies for Managing Up

So, how do you put this into practice? It’s not about grand gestures, but about small, consistent actions that build over time. It’s about being proactive, not reactive. It’s about thinking one step ahead and anticipating your boss’s needs. Here are a few practical strategies that have served me well throughout my career:

1. Understand Your Boss’s World: What are their biggest challenges and priorities? What does success look like for them? The more you understand their world, the better you can support them.
2. Don’t Just Bring Problems, Bring Solutions: Anyone can point out a problem. A valuable employee is one who has thought through the issue and come up with a potential solution. It shows initiative and a commitment to the success of the team.
3. Learn Their Communication Style: As I mentioned earlier, this is crucial. Pay attention to how your boss communicates and adapt your own style accordingly. If you’re not sure, just ask them!
4. Be a Low-Maintenance Employee: This doesn’t mean you should never ask for help, but it does mean you should be self-sufficient and resourceful. Don’t go to your boss with every little question. Try to find the answer yourself first.
5. Always Be Honest: Trust is everything. Never lie or try to cover up a mistake. It will always come back to bite you.

A Personal Story: How Managing Up Propelled My Career

When I was an Operations Manager at Reed in Partnership, I was tasked with a massive government contract. The targets were ambitious, to say the least, and the pressure was immense. My Senior Operations Manager, let’s call him David, was a visionary leader, but he was also stretched incredibly thin. He had a dozen other projects on the go, and he didn’t have time to get bogged down in the details of mine. I knew that if I was going to succeed, I needed to manage him as much as I managed my team.

I made it my mission to be the easiest part of his day. I sent him a concise, bullet-pointed email every Friday afternoon with a summary of our progress, our challenges, and our plan for the week ahead. I never went to him with a problem without having a proposed solution. I learned to anticipate his questions and have the answers ready. When we hit a major roadblock with a data-sharing agreement, I didn’t just dump the problem on his desk. I researched the issue, spoke to the relevant stakeholders, and presented him with three viable options. He was able to make a quick decision, and we kept the project on track.

That proactive approach not only made my life easier, but it also built a huge amount of trust between us. David knew he could count on me to handle things, which freed him up to focus on the bigger picture. When it came time to report our results, we had not only met the government’s targets, but we had exceeded them by 35%. That achievement was a turning point in my career, and it wouldn’t have been possible without a conscious effort to manage up.

Take Control of Your Career

Managing up is a skill, and like any skill, it takes practice. It’s about being intentional and proactive in your relationship with your boss. It’s about understanding that you are a partner in their success, not just a subordinate. When you master the art of managing up, you not only make your boss more effective, but you also take control of your own career. You become a more valuable employee, you create more opportunities for yourself, and you make your work life a whole lot more enjoyable.

If you’re a new manager feeling overwhelmed by the challenges of your role, I can help. I’ve been there, and I’ve learned the lessons the hard way. Book a free, no-obligation consultation with me today, and let’s talk about how you can build a stronger relationship with your boss and become the leader you were meant to be. Or, for more immediate practical advice, download my free New Manager’s Survival Guide. It’s packed with the tips and strategies I’ve learned over my 10+ years in leadership.