13 Common Types of Bosses

Every year the Gallup Organization conducts a survey of American workers to determine the level of employee satisfaction in the U.S., and every year’s results reflect a shocking statistic. According to the 2015 survey, 68% of workers were either disengaged (meaning they had mentally checked out of their current job) or actively disengaged (meaning they had checked out to the extent that they were actively working against their company success either through sabotage or purposeful non-productivity). Only 32% of workers surveyed reported they were actively engaged in helping their organization to succeed and giving their best work to their employer.

 

Since 2011, the number of actively engaged employees has increased just 3%, still leaving less than one in three employees consistently and willingly committing his or her discretionary energy to ensuring the organization’s long-term well-being. If engagement is the tide that raises all ships, this lack of disengagement acts as a tsunami of indifference and frustration that has the power to sink even the stoutest of organizational institutions.

Again, this past year, employees cited their relationship with their supervisor as the number one determinate of their job satisfaction. This means that you, the boss, the manager, and the leader, has the ability to either engage your people’s heads, hands, and hearts in pursuit of your success, or render them ineffective. Given the responsibly you, as a manager, have to your people and your organization, what type of boss are you?  Are you part of the solution, helping to build the engagement of your people, or are you unknowingly tearing apart their drive to do their best work for you?

In my research and practice, I have found there to be 13 common types of bosses.  Which one would your people say describes you best?

1. The Tron – Characterized by an empty desk, empty in- and out-baskets, and nary a photo of family anywhere to be found. You are all business all the time. There is little if any emotional connection to anyone in the organization. You are the master of productivity and delegation. Your workaholic tendency is legendary. Only the strong survive working for you. You have one schedule, your schedule, and you stick to it with robotic like precision. 
2. The Friend – You try to make things easier on your people by not ruffling feathers. As a result, you rarely hold your people accountable. You try to be a friend first in all situations. The problem is that the slackers are allowed to continue slacking, leaving the stars to pick up the slack, again and again. You don’t make difficult decisions. Instead, you ask your people to do the impossible and try to figure things out on their own and fight their own unwinnable battles.  In the end, your best people leave because they are asked to make up for your deficiencies and the slacker’s poor performance. But hey, at least you still have friends. 
3. The Shape Shifter – You consistently espouse empty promises. You will say anything to anyone just to get your way or get what you want out of others. You know it’s manipulation, but it seems effective. It doesn’t matter who you have to betray because you are all about your own needs. When called out on your behavior, you have strategies in place to deflect the attention away from you and position yourself for the best possible outcome. Just when the wrath is about to fall, you have an uncanny way to blend into the environment, deflect all responsibility, and live to coerce yet another day. 
4. Missing in Action – You are hard to find.  You have a way of having a “thing” whenever you are needed most. You are a master of using your schedule to avoid actual work. It’s amazing how many “closed door” meetings you seem to schedule at the most inopportune time. Maybe because of incompetence, or maybe because of laziness, you find ways to get out of work at every turn. Your style is chaotic because nobody really knows what is expected. Nobody can count on you. Some question if you even still work there.
5. The Snake – You give compliments, or what could be considered a compliment, if your people didn’t realize it was actually a backhanded compliment. You bite at your people, are constantly in a sloppy mood, can find a way to tear down even the most confident and competent of employee, and you bring out the worst in everyone. You say that you use persuasion, but you actually use manipulation and coercion to get what you want. After working for you, your people either need to have a shrink on speed dial or need to be heavily medicated.
   
6. The Dream – You can’t be real because you are everything your people want in a boss. You provide positive reinforcement, support, encouragement, and you follow through on your commitments and promises. You are everything your people have read what a great boss should be. Your people will go to the ends of the earth to make you look good because they know you will deflect the credit back to them.  You include your people in the decision making process and provide reasoning for your actions. You manage to your people’s strengths and help them minimize their weaknesses. Your people give you the best of themselves. Too bad you rarely exist in real life.
7. The Martyr – Your core focus is similar to The Dream. You provide positive reinforcement, support, encouragement and you follow through on your commitments and promises. However, you also try to protect your direct reports from repercussions for their poor performance and from leaders such as the Serial Killer, Snake or Ladder Climber.  You may also take on duties that your people find unpleasant in an effort to win favor with them, your peers and boss. You seem to constantly be throwing yourself on the proverbial sword. Unfortunately, your actions will never be rewarded and in the end, will probably come back to bite you because what you are really teaching your people is how to take advantage of you.
8. The Developer – Also similar to the Dream in focus. This individual wraps their energy around making their people better at their jobs. You focus your attention so finitely on the development of your people that you may forget to develop yourself. You provide learning and certification opportunities to your people and forgo your own needs in a move similar to what a Martyr would do. Your people become so good at their jobs that they are plucked from you on a regular basis and replaced with employees to refill the pipeline of talent. Rest assured, you will never get promoted or recognized because your type is critical to the survival of the organization … and is exceedingly rare to find.
9. The Serial Killer – Your leadership style is best described as … intense.  Known to throw tantrums and anything you can grab, you abuse everyone who is unlucky enough to have to work for you, making your people’s lives a complete nightmare. You lack empathy, compassion, emotional intelligence, and any other people-skill imaginable. Your goal in life is to make people as miserable in their lives as you are with yours. You view you people as inferior to you in competence, experience, and intelligence. Far and away the worst boss to try to survive. Not sure if this definition fits? If you have to ask, the answer is probability yes. Check your employee turnover numbers and the left side scores on your employee opinion surveys. Chances are you that have killed the careers of countless qualified employees. You look to autocratic leaders and sociopaths as role-models.
10. The Analytic – You love your numbers. Everything you do is broken down into measurable pieces. If it can’t be quantified, you don’t think it matters. You look at success and failure in terms of a spreadsheet, not based on the root causes, behaviors, or cracks in the foundation of your culture.  Rarely do you ever wade into the pool of soft skills. You have trouble forming meaningful relationships because to you everyone is just a number who can be replaced with a newer, cheaper version.
11. The Inventor – You are always asking, “What if?” You live your life through the lens of possibilities. You are driven to find new ways to solve problems, to innovate, and to risk failure in the name of learning.  You can be charismatic and inspiring. However, you may spend too much time in the world of possibilities and too little time in the world of the here and now. You are interested in the future and are driven to answer “what if” to everything. Hope your people can keep up with your unbridled enthusiasm and comfort with risk.
12. The Ladder Climber – You drive the car of the CEO, dress for the next job you want, and surround yourself with “A-listers”. What you have in style, you struggle with in substance. To you, being called a “brownnoser” is a compliment. On your way up the ladder, you realize you may step on some toes and climb over the backs of some people, but you believe the means are justified by the ends. Your peers don’t trust you because they have seen, and may have experienced, your carnage.
13. The Nitpicker – You have crazy attention to detail. You are a micromanager who likes to control the work of your people all the time. You control the “what”, “when”, “how”, “where”, and “why” of all work. Nothing is enough for you. You are driven to be more, to do better and refuse to celebrate successes because you don’t want to appear soft. You are focused on fixing people’s weaknesses, not exploring their strengths. You also have a way of finding everyone’s weaknesses. You believe your approach is just tough love, but your high standards are actually code for unrealistic expectations of perfection.

Do you see yourself in one of these 13 common types of bosses?  Are you a combination of more than one? More importantly, do you like how your people would describe you?  If you don’t like who you are as a leader, a manager, or a boss, don’t despair. Just like any other skill, learning to lead is a skill takes time. By focusing on what you do that is destructive and changing your approach, you can become a better version of yourself.

Scott Brown, MSOL, is the Founder Hardie Consulting, an  Orlando, FL based management consulting firm. Scott is a coach, consultant, author, and award-winning speaker who has successfully helped countless organizations learn how to meet shifting customer and employee expectations. Follow him on Twitter: @ScottBrownMSOL, connect with him on LinkedIn, visit his company’s website:  www.HardieConsulting.com, and check out his new book, Alignment: How to Transform Potential into Performance, Productivity and Profit, available on Amazon or CreateSpace to learn more about how to create a healthy organizational culture and highly engaged workforce.