Managers Who Coo About “I Judge Effort Through Results” Are Oft Clueless

Tale as old as time — Manager Who Doesn’t Quite Understand.

Sadly in my own professional arc, I’ve had more bad managers than good ones. I’ve had a few real winners, a few real losers, and most of them are in-between. The standard default for a white-collar manager in modernity, it seems, is to essentially ignore you until there’s a problem that he/she has been contacted about, and then either approach you with (a) empathy or (b) disdain, demanding to know what ball was dropped. Most managers seem to operate in this place: complete ignorance of everything up to and including your name until they need you for something. Again, this is most I’ve seen. You may have seen a different model. I’m not you.

Emotional and professional absenteeism

One common thing about modern middle managers is their over-reliance on outdated, unproven tropes and sayings they picked up from back issues of Forbes. A big one is something like “God can present belief, but all others must show data!” That’s a comical one because most in managerial roles barely have…