How do I girl boss?

[AmzMcl]

Hello! I'm 32 and in a corporate job where I manage a bunch of teenagers. I wonder if this is how all management roles feel? It drains me and makes me have little social battery left for my family and friends. I honestly don't want to speak to anyone after most days in work. I don't know if this is "the price to pay" or is this normal to be drained at this level ... and when I progress will it be better?

Managing Gen Z is hard and there can be difficulties as a woman due to leadership stereotypes. Could you get a coach or mentor?

Who are you to speak for us all? Females is ok situation dependent.

Girl boss i agree is awful.

What’s this?

OP I think you've had a hard time over your wording as you’ve complained about your team behaving like teenagers whilst also using language that makes you sound like a teenager yourself.

Its not normal to feel drained by managing people but for some people it doesn’t come naturally and may feel harder.

Do you have sufficient support and a mentor at work?

I have a 70% incompetent team on plans and it stresses me out. I just wanted to know if that's normal.

I'm not a manager of any kind but I’m guessing the answer to this is no. How did you get the job OP?

Not one to usually cross reference posts but you mention on ‘hitting the sesh’ that you are ‘only 10% there’ in terms of concentration etc at work. This may well be contributing to your feelings of ‘drowning’. Additionally, your team either know about your life outside work or sense your energy and commitment and are feeding off it. A team without decent leadership will become draining for that leader. Vicious circle 🤷🏻‍♀️

So people that fall asleep have been pulled up and on plans. Others who I refer to are on attendance plans, performance plans etc.

Red flag here.

I managed a team of 20 (media agency so average age in the company is 25/26)

In my most dire moment i had 2 people simultanously on plans ( one was inherited, one was an internal hire unilaterally hired by big boss against my strong advice). Thry were gone cleanly in 4m.

Sounds like your team has a culture of mediocrity and dont give a fuck attitudes.

You need to follow through and sack / dismiss the lame performers (anyone under 2 yrs employment is a piece of piss to remove). Tap your network, hire in some "stars" and make it clear life is going to be uncomfortable for passengers / "people who dont want to win" in your team.
If they had +2yrs and shit attitudes / shit performance and were awkward to pip i starved them out.
They got boring / low prestige work they couldnt fuck up too badly and I gave 0% raises and 0% bonuses.
You generally make their life uncomfortable in various ways so they want to leave.

I can work with any level of ineptitude if they want to succeed and want to win.
Your team sounds indifferent - you need to clean house.

Managing people is hard, which is why you get paid more. I'd say it's fairly normal to find it tiring. People who are great at their job don't always make the best managers. What training have you had? Find some management development resources and up skill.

Honestly, If I had a leader that had 70% of their staff on performance plans, I would expect to be providing that leader with significant support to improve their skills and up team performance.

We have first line managers with up to 8-10 team members working for them. Anything more than two PIPs a year would raise a flag, it would be an eyebrow raised at more than one and we’d be monitoring closely to see what we could do to improve things.

Leadership shouldn’t be exhausting in the way you describe. You and they are professionals there to do a job, there should be minimal drama and mostly just steering and guidance from you when all is working well.

It does sound as if perhaps you could do with more support. And your team need to pull their socks up or move on.

Can you speak to your manager or to HR?

Omg everyone it's not that deep! OP is asking for support with a management role and everyone is just spitefully attacking her. I say girlboss sometimes in an ironic way as OP is doing. Very boring and useless thread if this is just going to be the pile-on.

To answer your question, no I don't feel like this because I work in a company that can sack employees who are not performing. Some people survive PIPs if they genuinely put in effort. I don't control hiring into the team but the company overall has a good quality bar. Therefore team management is one of the best parts of the job as 90% of people are very engaged.

Can you consider options outside of your current workplace, where you could manage a team but have more control over how it runs? Perhaps consider an industry switch, or working for a smaller company rather than a large unwieldy one?

It sounds like you're having a really hard time. There are some things you can do to help a bit, perhaps.

Have you noticed on here you've fixated on and persistently responded to criticism? But this doesn't help you - it's just tiring and upsetting. So let that go. If people are going to persistently post the same point, let them.

Separate that from the information you are getting from them. That mode of speech seems to get some people's back up. So at work, try something else. No biggie.

In general, management is not about you that much. Your juniors will project things on to you, no matter what you do or say, because there's a part of you that is not quite real to them: the "boss" part. So get comfortable with that. It's a new kind of relationship. Your job is just to find out what the team needs to do and find out what they need to get it done. That's it really. Make yourself available, get your hands on resources, and keep bringing them all back to the goals.

It's a tough adjustment, but lots of people make it. Good luck.

@AmzMcl what are the actual issues you are struggling with as a manager?

Honestly you just don't sound cut out for management. You say you're not looking for management advice but it sounds like you're doing a pretty bad job and have been unable to motivate your team. Maybe have a think about a different direction?

Why do you keep saying you work for a large organisation and therefore people can’t be sacked? It demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding.

You don’t want advice on your management skills but it’s clear that is what you need.

Along with some equality training.

Oh dear…

I'm 40 and manage a firm of people ranging from 23 to 55, I do sometimes find dealing with the politics and internal disputes exhausting but set up a good mentorship structure within your organisation and that should help. I'm incredibly busy but make sure that people ever need me I will find time for them that day. I set a good example by working as hard, if not harder than the juniors. I need to improve the timeliness of giving feedback on tasks. I would start with doing an anonymous survey into workplace happiness, training needs etc and make sure you incorporate 360 degree feedback into the appraisal process so you understand what you do well and what you can improve upon. Treating your colleagues like professionals and expecting the best of them is a a good place to start. Possibly ask for some management training. (I despise girlies and girl boss but I don't think it's the thing to focus on here.) If you have any specific difficulties, ask.

Without piling in on your use of the term “girl boss”, it is quite a teenage turn of phrase, so perhaps if you feel your colleagues are “teenagers”, it’s a reflection of your management style?

Your post resonated with me. (Not the girls/women bit that’s have found upsetting?!) I’ve discovered I’m actually an introvert so I find management quite draining. I give a lot to my work, something I consciously decided a long time ago but I need to make sure I have plenty of decompression time. I care deeply about things others wouldn’t which I think makes me good at what I do but the impact on me at times is anxiety. I’d like more balance, not quite sure how to achieve that!

I also read “nice girls don’t get the corner office” you might enjoy it.

All people in management are often drained at the end of the day - my DH manages nearly 320 people across the world, with responsibility for the several thousand that report into him. He is often so tired at the end of a week/night that getting more than grunts out of him is impossible until he’s had a few beers and/or a good nights sleep. Cricket on the TV seems to help, too. Some days he comes home pale and exhausted because of some management issue or other with a difficult reportee.

He wouldn’t frame it as the stress of being a ‘boy boss’, though, and the the two women who did the job before him - one now the CFO - would definitely not have played into sex stereotypes to frame the impact of the responsibility of being in senior management.

I’d speak to HR and see if you can have some additional management training - it’s usually available - and couch it as wanting to enhance and develop your management skills. Often within that there is scope to be mentored/coached so that you can explore stress management and work/life balance as long term being so tired that you cannot enjoy your home life tends to erode effectiveness in the workplace. What you may find useful is a course on how to mentor your individual team members as upskilling and developing their skills would alleviate some of the issues and foster a more positive and productive working relationship.

I’ve managed many teams of people, and still do. I’d say that people management is one of the more challenging aspects of a senior role (my husband used to say I’d come home and start managing him too 😀). However, if you’re feeling drained every day, perhaps you’re just not cut out for the role.

To be fair also girl boss is completely different to management. Listen to the squiggly careers podcast

Something is going badly wrong with your recruitment, or your company can't afford to pay the right money for the skills needed.