please can I have some advice for dealing with poor leaders at work they have little respect for and a question as a subordinate how do you handle a leader who leads from a place of ego and isn’t transparent with information yes so these were a couple questions actually that I got and I just kind of bunched them together because my answer is gonna be very similar for each of them and it’s actually very similar to a situation that I’m dealing with right now the chasm helping out and I wrote something to him recently and what happened was he’s in a situation where a leader had come in that didn’t have the knowledge inside the industry they were working in so he came from another industry got put into a leadership position and that guy that new leader was resisting change and not giving support to the new procedures that the guy was coaching was trying to implement so he was kind of you know at a loss for what to do you know you got this new manager that’s coming in that’s inexperienced and he and the guy I’m coaching obviously doesn’t respect him because it doesn’t have a lot of knowledge in this industry and so here’s the advice I gave I said you need to set this up to make the new manager look good make some adjustments to the words you are choosing the tact you are taking and the focus you are using to ensure that your changes make him look good not bad now this is so counterintuitive for people it’s so counterintuitive cuz they gets that person that’s above them in the chain of command that doesn’t know as much as them that’s not as smart as them and what do they want to do they want to bring them down they want to prove to everybody that they’re better I’m better than that guy they drowned that guy I deserve that guy’s job that’s what everybody’s instinct is to do mm-hm and it’s wrong it’s wrong somehow let the ideas come from him or make him the approver or the driver of some of the s aspects that he can handle so I’m actually saying go out of your way to make this easier for this guy make him look good give him credit it’s your ego that wants to pull him down put your ego in check help him without being condescending or acting like you know more than him he shouldn’t even know you are helping him have you ever been this is so fun to do is when you know EKKO doesn’t know this section of the equipment mm-hmm so I don’t say hey since you don’t know this I’ll teach it to you right this condescending tone of you know but instead of like hey have you ever seen the way this one works I know you have you ever seen this specific equipment before because the way it works it’s a little bit different than some of the other ones is you got to do this this and this and you can sit back and you can accept that knowledge without feeling like you don’t know it right so I’m teaching you but I’m doing it a clandestine management and that’s what we’re trying to do because we’re trying to build Oh charity we’re trying to build a relationship here that’s what we’re trying to do we’re trying to build a relationship and if I go since you don’t know how to use this I’ll show you now what does that do put you on the defensive makes you considered me to be a threat now I’m threatening and that’s not good he should even know you are helping him respect what he does and show him that you respect it so hey you know I know this is you probably haven’t been down the weeds on this type of gear in a while but hey this is the way you don’t know saying like you actually I actually respect the fact that you’re up top in charge and I’m just a frontline guy but here’s how you do this if you ever add to right you know what I mean just downplay what he doesn’t know and subtly help him to learn it right you know you probably would never have to do this this this new equipment over here I mean I know it’s a little bit below your level here’s how it works if you ever needed it boom you don’t mean not like you don’t know how to do this right you don’t want an adversarial relationship with this new leader you want him to support and help you he will do that if you are making him look good this is so easy man this is so easy and so hard because everybody’s ego will get in the way everybody’s Eagle will get in the way extreme ownership often requires covert and clandestine indirect actions so all these things that I’m talking about helping the guy without him knowing letting him take credit for ideas without him knowing all these little aspects they’re indirect actions they’re not going head to head it’s like jujitsu it’s jujitsu all the time everything’s jujitsu you don’t want to if you know I’m gonna do an armbar mm-hmm I’m not gonna get the armbar right you’re gonna defend that so I have to go take indirect actions and set things up and take my time and be clandestine and covert this is chess not checkers this is where you need to master your ability to influence which as we talked about a little couple podcasts ago is actually manipulation I’m manipulating this guy to think that he’s got something over me I’m inflating his ego while I’m putting my ego in check I’m making him feel like he’s even better and that makes him feel good it makes him want to support me because I make him look good this is this is just basic if you do this wrong the new manager will resist you at every turn if you do this right he will be your biggest supporter now this is the same thing with leaders that you’re quote/unquote don’t respect first of all there should be something that you respect about everybody everybody that you meet you should have some kind of respect for them and by the way if you don’t respect someone what is making you not respect them hmm it’s your ego it’s your ego that makes you not respect people because you think oh I’m better than them I should have their job they don’t know what they’re talking about and I do mm-hmm that’s all ego so put your ego in check and just be like okay this person’s above me they seem really inexperienced but what can I learn from them how did they get there if they’re so dumb and bad at this job how come they outrank me mm-hmm let me learn something from them let me learn something from them put your ego in check and this is the key point and any time I talk about quote-unquote leading up the chain of command I will talk about this that no matter what boss I work for and I work for every different kind of boss egomaniac psychopaths wonderful guys intelligent guys brilliant guys tactician I work for every different kind of boss and I always had the same relationship with all of them that was my job was to build that relationship and that was a relationship of high trust so they trust me they were to stay out of my way and let me do what I wanted and that’s how you win which by the way when you win they should never know you win they shouldn’t even know that there was a competition happening and that way you can do what you want and so that is how you deal with people above you and the chain of command that you have little respect for or that lead from a place of ego you build a relationship with them you don’t go head to head with them you’re not gonna win going head to head with your boss they’re your boss they have rank on you if they’re an egomaniac they’re gonna use that rank mm-hmm if there’s someone that you don’t respect you gotta build a relationship with them if there’s someone that’s an egomaniac you gotta build a really regardless of the situation the solution is the same build the relationship of trust help them build them up take a back seat let them get credit it’s all those things and once you do that you’re gonna have you’re gonna have much better results than if you try and bang heads with them overcome them defeat them have an antagonistic relationship with them it’s never gonna work mm-hmm so play the game
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