To think that good managers don’t ask colleagues to “look in my diary and book something?”

I think this is a sign of a good manager who has their diary up to date and has mastered the art of delegation.

It seems completely normal to me and a bit odd that you'd take issue with it.

It surely rakes a moment and means you get to choose what's convenient for you.

IME senior staff diaries are a free for all, if there's a gap, it's yours, whereas more junior staff expect to be consulted/don't manage their diaries to the same degree so a gap doesn't necessarily mean they're available.

This 100%. You can now get Outlook to find the next available slot when you are trying to book a meeting with multiple people. But it doesn't work because people don't keep their diaries up to date, just write A/L at the top without marking as out of office or accept team members A/L requests into their own diary.

I'd judge a team member for not being able to use outlook

I could understand slight annoyance if it was like a friend asked if you wanted to go for a meal and then said you book it. But this isn’t the same.

It’s a lot easier than going back and forth asking when they are free or doodle polls or whatever. I comply when asked and ask other people to do look in my diary to arrange meetings, not a problem

I super like this option (find a space in their diary & book a meeting) & encourage colleagues to do it too, it saves time if we are the ones initiating the meeting.

I have a set of collaborators, different dept, who used to tell us to "email Sally" to book a meeting. I could see collaborators diaries fine. Sally could take weeks to reply or never reply. WTAF. Of course I didn't want to go thru Sally. I felt like I was dragging my collabs in to 21st century.

I'm a Manager and I ask staff to book in at a time that suits them, my diary is shared and they can see when I am free, they may have different deadlines, it lets them fit it around their commitments. I don't want them to stress that they have to fit a meeting in with me that I dictate if they are up against it

You sound lile a nightmare to work with. How do you get on with your manager and colleagues?

Do you think you have form for sweating the small stuff?

They have read the situation. The situation is that they are your manager, they don’t know your availability or preferences, and you have a system specifically set up to quickly indicate mutually available times.

This feels like it's not about booking meetings. It's you not liking having a manager directing you to do something.

It's a perfectly reasonable request. They're not passing off anything massive on you. And there is no equality on terms of workload to consider. They've got a shit tonne more work than you, and masses of admin you have no idea about that keeps your projects running.

You'd hate me then. I was brought up to believe that your career development was responsibility. If you want regular manager meetings you schedule them. I will happily turn up and work with you but I am not chasing you around. If I need to speak to you I'll schedule a call or, if I am busy and you have more time, I'll ask you to find a spot in my calendar.

I also believe strongly that my team are adults who can manage their own schedules. I hate micro-managing. I am very conscious that it is important to give credit to those who do the work and not hog it for myself. I care about the team as individuals... but I am not doing the work to get you a promotion, that is for you to do!

Completely normal practice

I think YABU and clearly, 90% on this thread think so too.

I see nothing whatsoever wrong with leaving it up to the employee to pick a time that suits them. It actually feels better to me. Sorry OP but nitpicking such tiny small things makes you sound very unreasonable and quite difficult to work with

My manager does this, I think it’s good, so you can plan enough time to get up to speed on the subject first, we usually ask, how urgent is it? If it’s not obvious. Works well, I’d rather that than have him poking about in my calendar.

FFS you sound v difficult. « Accountability »! We are talking about booking a meeting.
My manager asks me to book meeting with him, I ask people in my team to book some
with me, nobody cares!

Way more efficient than 1) booking a timeslot and have to change it because the other person is not available, or 2) checking availability and then offering a few timeslots for the other person to choose from.

Such an interesting clash of cultures. Are you Gen Z by any chance OP? You seem to need your manager to demonstrate that they value your time, because to you they are asking a favour, in a way, by asking to meet with you. They are asking for your time, when you'd maybe already planned to prioritise it another way and asking you to do something different, which doesn't respect your autonomy in your work, and gives you an additional task to do.

That feels more like Gen Z than older middle management Millenials or Gen X bosses.

I think there are some places where line managers need to signal that they have a keen interest in their managee's development. I would always do a set-piece approach to booking monthly 121s for instance and do loads of the admin myself as a boss. This shows I take supporting the team to develop seriously. I wouldn't say "Just find a time in my diary and pop in your annual appraisal". That doesn't give it the right gravitas. And I do value their time and development and want them to have a good and productive meeting with me where we can both share feedback. It's on me to make that space work.

However for a project meeting or a quick catch up about emerging developments I would expect to be able to say, effectively, I need you to reprioritise your time to give me some more of your time, please find a slot. I find it a bit laughable and naive (Sorry, I am Gen x!!) that someone needs this level of stroking and validation about the value of their contribution that they would need the booking politely done for them. It isn't actually a request, it's an instruction to have that meeting. Truth is you're less experienced than your manager, literally of less value to the organisation financially; so time bound admin tasks need to be considered with that in mind. Your contribution is valued but you also should be (sort of) grateful for the opportunity to report in, hear about the business and learn something from your manager. They arent meeting you because they are somehow getting a personal kick out of throwing their weight around, but because they need to know something about your work, maybe course correct you, or identify an upcoming issue, or let you know something strategic that will affect you. Rightly, you know less about what they are juggling because they have to weigh up priorities on a bigger canvas than you.

They also have to show up more prepared, calm, in a leadership mindset, and use more skills to manage themselves than you do. It is their prerogative to arrange their day such that it enables them to do this successfully. So you ultimately have a better time at work as they show up better ready to lead you.

I'm afraid I'm with the person who thinks you could just change your attitude as you seem super entitled to be honest and if I were your boss I would think about whether you were ready for more responsibility.

If this is on teams then just look in their diary there and then and book it. If it's not on teams then they don't have their diary in front of them.

I think the actual act of getting a direct report to do this isn't a sign of a good or a poor manager, but a good manager is doing to to offer flexibility and a poor one to shift responsibility.

Poor managers are usually lazy and palm off their work. Good managers delegate task and do thier own work

But they are on a higher salary, and therefore their time is worth more. They shouldn’t be wasting time on lower order tasks when there are lower paid employees who could do these.

This is fairly standard where I work for anyone not senior enough to have a PA. The person who initiated the meeting puts it in the diary, or if it's a manager, they might ask their report to do it.

Think your looking for issues that aren’t there
it’s the most efficient way of doing it

sounds like u resent authority and see this is the same league as though there asking you to make a cup of tea for them

I do this. If someone wants to discuss something then the onus is on them to find a time to do so. It also helps me manage people putting things in that could just be an email (sometimes they don’t bother with putting in the meeting and just do an email) and also helps me understand if junior staff members know how to use Outlook properly. The number of them in the last 5-10 years who don’t know how to is definitely rising. I follow up if I don’t hear back and then will show them how to use the scheduling assistant function for going forwards.

I don't have a problem with this, but the last person who asked me to do this then accepted 'tentative' and cancelled on the day so maybe it's a sign they are not committed to the meeting, even if they asked for it.

That’s standard, and appreciated, in the team I manage.

Yesterday, for example, a colleague who is due to sit an exam asked me to meet with him to go over a specific topic. We already have a weekly preparation session, but he wants an extra one this week. I said, as I often do, look at my diary and book us in at a time that suits you. He is site based, so does not have as much flexibility as I do.

This arrangement works really well for my team.