Managing Up with Confidence and Clarity

A common question I get when I teach leadership development training is “What do I do if my boss does none of this?” Meaning, the participant is learning leadership best practices but notices that their own manager leads in ways counter to what the participant is learning.

Many with this experience appear agitated or maybe they're annoyed at being asked to attend training because they feel their boss is the one who should be sitting in the seat.

The response to this question is often the same “Focus on what’s within your control. You can’t control your boss’s style, skills, or choices. But you can control how you react to them.”

It’s easier said than done, for sure. But it is also at the core of what managing up means.  

I'm not talking about fixing your boss, flattering them, or secretly pulling strings. It is about intentionally shaping the relationship so you can both do your best work and the organization benefits.

The fact that you may have new, different, or even better skills than your boss (because of training or experience) just positions you to be more effective at managing up. It comes down to two important things:

1. Avoid judging your manager and their style, skill set, and choices. Focusing on their flaws will drag you down.

2. Influence them with your own behavior. Behave in ways that you want them to.

Managing up is the best way to do this. Here are some tips.

What managing up really means

There are a variety of definitions. Here are two that I like:

“Working with your superior to obtain the best possible results for you, your boss, and the company.”  (Managing Your Boss, Gabarro and Kotter)

“Being a genuine source of help…being the most effective employee you can be, creating value for your boss and your organization.” (What everyone should know about managing up, Rousmaniere)

In practice, this looks like understanding your boss’s style, expectations, and pressures; aligning your work and communication to support those; and being a reliable source of help and information.

When you add new collaboration skills from training, managing up also means thoughtfully introducing those skills into the relationship instead of assuming everyone has the same context.

Start with self and boss awareness

Style awareness is the starting point. This means to know your boss’s preferences and your own and then adapt. Experts on managing up advise the same foundation: people who understand a manager’s communication and decision-making style are better able to anticipate needs and use their boss’s limited time well.

Try this quick reflection:

• How does my manager prefer to receive information: email, chat, or live? Brief bullets or full context?

• What are they being measured on right now (metrics they share upward, key projects, political pressures)?

• When do our styles clash most (pace, detail, structure, conflict avoidance)?

• When does my manager appear to be at their best? Or, when do they seem most motivated?

Now pair that with a snapshot of your own style. You might be someone who thrives on structured agendas and clear expectations, while your boss is more ad hoc. Maybe you have also noticed they are energized and decisive in the morning but drained and irritable by late afternoon, and you are the opposite—at your best later in the day and bringing big decisions to them then. What if you flipped that and brought key decisions to them in the morning, when their energy and focus are highest?

The goal is not to change their style but to consciously adapt yours where it matters most to outcomes.

Also, if you don’t know the answers to the questions, ask. Say, “I’d like to learn more about your preferences so that I can be sure I’m working with you in the best way.” Many managers welcome this conversation. It demonstrates a desire to genuinely know their experience. Sometimes, just getting to know a manager on this level is enough to influence the relationship in the right direction.

Managing up with new skills they don’t share

A common tension is this: you just completed a training on communication or conflict skills, you are excited to apply them, but your boss and peers did not attend. You now have language (e.g., “performance coaching” and “psychological safety,”) and an ability to diagnose teamwork problems with framework and tools others lack.

This is a transfer-of-training challenge: how do you move skills from the classroom into a real workplace that has not changed with you?

Three principles help:

1. Lead with outcomes, not jargon. Instead of “I learned a feedback model,” say, “I’d like us to define roles and processes at project kickoff so that we’re start off on the same page.”

2. Ask for experiments, not permanent change. Propose, “Can we try a 10‑minute project debrief for the next two weeks and see if it helps?” Small, time-bound experiments are easier to accept.

3. Make it about making their job easier. Frame new practices as a way to reduce surprises, rework, or misalignment for them, which is the essence of managing up.

This is how you avoid coming across as “teaching” your boss or implying they are doing it wrong. You are offering tools in service of shared goals.

Cascading your new skills to peers

Managing up is often easier when you are not the only one doing it. Advice on knowledge and skill transfer suggests that regular, informal sharing (brown-bag sessions, quick huddles, mentoring) significantly strengthens how well new skills stick and spread.

You can:

• Host a “working better with our boss” micro‑session. Invite peers for 30 minutes to discuss what the boss values, how they like to communicate, and what tends to create friction. Add two or three tools from your training as options, not mandates.

• Integrate concepts into existing rhythms. Use stand‑ups, project kickoffs, or retros to model skills like expectation‑setting, appreciative feedback, or naming conflict early, without calling it “a training technique.”

• Offer one‑on‑one coaching-lite. When colleagues struggle with the boss, share a simple reframe: “What do you think they are solving for? How could you make it easier for them to say yes?” This keeps the focus on influence and partnership rather than complaint.

In doing this, you are not just applying new skills. Instead, you are quietly shifting the team culture toward more intentional, upward collaboration.

Keeping the relationship healthy and with boundaries

Effective managing up is grounded in trust and reliability: doing what you say you will do, being transparent when you cannot, and flagging risks early. It also requires boundaries, especially when you are the “skilled” one who sees better ways of working.

Two final guidelines:

• Do not try to fix your boss. Your responsibility is to understand them, adapt where you can, and surface issues constructively when they significantly affect work, not to redesign their personality.

• Protect your own capacity. Part of managing up is naming when priorities conflict or workload is unsustainable and coming with options, not martyring yourself in the name of being “helpful.”

When you weave together awareness of your manager, clarity about your own style, and a thoughtful approach to sharing your new skills, managing up becomes less about tiptoeing around power and more about co-creating a working relationship where both of you can do excellent work.

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Until next time!

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Amy Drader is a management consultant and credentialed coach with over 25 years’ experience in HR and operations. She knows first-hand the joys and challenges of leading people and is dedicated to helping managers and teams advance their performance. She is the owner of Growth Partners Consulting, a boutique leadership and team development consulting firm that provides customized training, coaching, and professional development resources.