Managers Matter: How to Care for Your Bosses

Managers play a critical role in organizations. In fact, nearly all employees say their immediate managers matter the most for well-being support at work. When it comes to the employee experience, managers are key to showing authentic care and supporting the whole employee. And a good manager can make the difference between employees choosing to stay or leave.

More than half of employees quit their job due to a challenging manager. 

54% of employees between the age of 18 and 34 quit their job due to a challenging manager compared to 41% of workers over the age of 55.

Source: Robert Half survey of more than 2,800 workers in the U.S. 

Read More: Why Employee Well-Being Depends on Managers

At Limeade, we believe managers help foster employee motivation, well-being and engagement. We know that it’s important for organizations to support managers and their well-being, to provide resources for them to manage and support their teams well. But managers still struggle to care for their employees.

Work overload, stressors and responsibility are all real challenges managers face in their roles — and these unrealistic expectations can ultimately lead to burnout. To avoid such an outcome, it’s important to celebrate managers and all the hard work they put into not only their role, but the organization and employees. Because when organizations show care for their managers, in return, managers can care for their employees.

Read More: E-Book: Can You Spot Burnout?

How can organizations, managers and employees care for managers?

Here are some clear, simple and easily implementable ways to take better care of your managers now.

Organizations can:

• Clarify goals and expectations: Support managers in clarifying and setting goals and expectations by providing technology to keep track of organizational goals and conversations.
• Offer manager self-care opportunities: Cultivate an intentional culture of manager support that strongly encourages, enables and expects manager self-care.
• Provide the right tools and resources: Invest in tools and technology that can help foster trust, inclusion and social recognition for managers to act as role models for employees.

Employees can: 

• Set and clarify expectations: Employees must first communicate their expectations to managers when it comes to manager support and goal clarity.
• Provide and receive quality feedback: Utilize company-wide surveys or anonymous feedback platforms to receive consistent feedback between employees and managers.
• Respect their time: Encourage employees to challenge themselves to take risks and problem solve on their own by reaching out to other individual contributors.

Managers can:

• Learn how to say no: As a manager, avoid unnecessary activities by preparing tactful ways to say “no”.
• Allow for recovery time: Recovery from demands can include blocked focus time on calendars, personal days to recharge or even small breaks throughout the day to reset and refocus on the work ahead.
• Stick to a schedule: It’s important for managers to hold themselves accountable for their workload, but it’s also just as important to consider boundaries and promote whole-person well-being.

Better managers means better employees, and better business. You can find more information about taking care of your employees and managers by heading over to Limeade.