Dear Madeleine,

I work on a great team. We do good work together, and we seem to always find a way to hit our milestones and deadlines. My problem is that our team lead seems to be inappropriately dependent on me.

He is pretty much AWOL most of the time and I am the only person on the team that he has regular contact with. He asked me to create a report to send him every week outlining where the team is with key projects. He sends me to almost all cross-functional meetings in his place, and I report back with updates on the agenda items, what decisions were made, etc.

Whenever anyone on the team has a problem, they hit me up on Slack and I am generally able to help them out. When I do feel the need to escalate, I send an email to the team lead and hope for a response, though I rarely get one. I usually end up using my best judgment and sending him an email telling him what I decided.

It took me a couple of months to notice just how out of contact he is with the rest of the team. I went for drinks with a couple of team members the other night and the topic came up.

It is now obvious to me that everyone on the team sees me as their leader and that nobody really knows what happened to our lead. We all feel like he just kind of fell off the planet. I am just not sure what to make of this.

I don’t really mind. I enjoy being helpful and I am able to get all of my work done, so the extra time isn’t a problem. But I worry that I am letting myself be taken advantage of. I also worry about what is going to happen when it comes to performance reviews, which are coming up soon. I know who on the team puts the time and effort in and who does the bare minimum, but I don’t feel like it is my job to be calling that out.

I am afraid my lead is going to ask me to handle the performance reviews and I need to be prepared. I think if I am going to do my boss’s job, I need to be paid more and be given the title. Ultimately, it seems unfair to me and to the team.

I have thought about bringing this up with him, but our infrequent 1×1’s are always rushed and packed with so many urgent things, there is never enough time.

Any suggestions? Thanks.

Missing Team Lead

___________________________________________________________________________

Dear Missing Team Lead,

I’m sorry—this situation sounds frustrating and upsetting. As someone with a high personal need for clarity, this would drive me insane. You don’t mention when it started or if something changed. Whatever happened to cause your manager to go missing in action, he should have asked you to take a larger role. He should have reached some clear agreements with you about how you would step up and negotiated how the added responsibility might be appropriately acknowledged and rewarded. It is really just that simple. You have definitely been put in an unfair position, and so far you have been a good sport about it. The question is what to do about it.

The choices available to you as always, variations on the classic:

1. Do nothing.
2. Do something.
3. Remove yourself from the situation.

As you think this through, your first step is to decide for yourself just how much ambiguity you can live with for how long, and identify what you really want. If you simply seek clarity, that might be easier to achieve than you expect. Or perhaps you simply want acknowledgement. If what you really want is a promotion, or even a bump in pay, that might be a little trickier. But if you don’t ask, the answer is always no, so getting more comfortable with asking for what you need will serve you well.

You really can do nothing and prepare to stay mum about anyone on the team. At some point your manager will either reappear, resign, or be fired—at which time hopefully you will be promoted to the role you have been doing.

The most obvious “do something” is to have the hard conversation with your AWOL boss. A model you might use to prepare, that has been extremely helpful to many of my clients, is Conversational Capacity. The author, Craig Weber, proposes that we all need to practice a mix of curiosity and candor. You might practice curiosity by asking your manager what is going on with him that is causing him to be so detached from work. You could practice candor by stating your position and how you arrived at it. You can read more about this here. Be clear about what you are experiencing, and express your concerns without blame or judgment. I recommend you practice with a friend to get both the words and the neutral tone right.

Another option would be to speak to your boss’s boss about it—but that depends entirely on your company’s culture. Only you can know if that approach would yield the result you want. If you have a good relationship with your boss’s boss, it could work. Again, avoid blame and judgment.

Removing yourself from the situation would mean trying to find another job, which would probably be overkill. But you could just stop stepping up and see what happens.

Once you decide what you really want and what you are willing to do (and risk) to get it, the choice will reveal itself. You sound level-headed and competent. I suspect you will find your way.

Love, Madeleine

About Madeleine

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services as well as a key facilitator of Blanchard’s Leadership Coach Certification course. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response soon. Please be advised that although she will do her best, Madeleine cannot respond to each letter personally. Letters will be edited for clarity and length.

Dear Madeleine,

I manage a large team of graphic artists for a popular online magazine. A few of my people are employees who do other tasks for the magazine, but most of my artists are independent contractors.

On the whole, they are professional and easy to work with—but a couple are simply a pain in my neck. They don’t take feedback, they try to re-negotiate the fee after we have signed the contract, and one routinely misses his deadline.

Of course I like to give the bulk of the work to the ones who are easy to work with. One of the difficult ones called me recently and challenged me on giving preferential treatment to a favored few. I was tongue tied and didn’t know what to say. I basically ended up stammering that I would pay more attention in the future. Am I being fair?

Feeling Unjust

Dear Unjust,

You are clearly a very nice person who worries about fairness. I am really trying to understand what it must be like to be you, and I am having a hard time—because I am not nice and I am pretty sure that nothing in life is fair. So bear with me, because I am going to give it to you straight here.

You are absolutely, 100 percent, no arguments about it, within your rights to choose who you want to work with. If all of these folks were full-time employees, you would have a different situation on your hands. If you were an evil genius who lived to negotiate professionals down on their fees by playing on their fears and making promises you didn’t intend to keep, you would be tempting karma.

But these folks are independent professionals—presumably adults—and you seem to be reasonable and kind. Your answer to the difficult person is this:

“I choose the best person for the job by considering style, professionalism, and how easy the person is to work with.”

Period. Full stop. That’s it.

It is not the place of anyone but your boss to challenge how you make your staffing choices. Your difficult artist is out of line and there is absolutely no reason for you to work with him ever again. If he were to ask for feedback, you could certainly give it to him—but to be honest, feedback is a gift and it is hard to give. So if he doesn’t ask, you don’t have to tell.

What I want for you, Feeling Unjust, is an entire group of artists who can get the job done on time, on budget, and with a relentless service orientation. Because you are the customer—and for most professionals, 100 percent of their income comes from customers.

You are probably going to feel like a big meanie, but you owe it to yourself to surround yourself with people who do high quality work and who are fun and easy to work with. You owe it to your company to choose the best people for the job. And you owe the people who do great work your gratitude, a good recommendation, and more work should it be available. You don’t owe anyone else anything at all.

Stand strong.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Dear Madeleine,

I recently found, left behind on the photocopier, a list of performance evaluations, pay, and bonuses for all of my coworkers.

Turns out new hires are being brought in at substantially higher pay and bonuses than what the old timers are getting. Also, a person who is universally viewed as a total slacker is getting paid more than some of the really good employees, including me.

I have been here several years and am well regarded—but I am in the middle of the heap in terms of salary, not near the top where I would expect to be. Now I am wondering why I bother spending all of those extra hours, nights, and weekends going the extra mile.

 I am tempted to pass this information around so everyone knows about this injustice, which seems to be borderline unethical. I am also considering just quitting and finding a job where I am truly valued for my talent and hard work.

Should I hit print and spread the word? Should I meet with my boss and demand a raise? Should I quit?

Really Ticked Off

Dear Really Ticked Off,

It can be painful, stumbling over an unpleasant truth. And my response may not make you feel better, so buckle up.

First some questions: did your company ever promise to be transparent about salaries? Did it ever promise that salaries would be commensurate with talent and effort? Does the organization pride itself on being a meritocracy?

No. No. And No.

Some more modern companies do promise this, so if you stumbled over this kind of information at Qualtrics or Buffer, for example, you would be right to be furious and self righteous about it and you would foment a revolt.

However, it appears that you work for a fairly normal organization, where salaries for similar job titles and roles fall within a wide band. The reason executives don’t want the natives talking about salaries is because compensation is usually unjust. Why?

• People who negotiated for a higher salary in their very first job will have a huge advantage by the time they get to their third or fourth gig. Men in particular tend to negotiate at every step of their career. It can add up to more than million dollars over a career. It might be maddening, and feel unfair, but all it really means is that nobody gets what they deserve, they get what they negotiate.
• Newer employees are probably getting paid more because it is what marketplace benchmarks are dictating. The organization will pay whatever it needs to acquire new talent and grow headcount as required in the moment.
• Perhaps there is shortage of talent in your geographical area, or of people with the desired skill and experience set at this particular time. This will benefit you if you want to look for a job elsewhere.

If you are in the middle of your pay band, it is probably because you have not negotiated your salary at every step, that you have settled for what you were offered, possibly even from your first job out of school. I am sure your employers are delighted to have such a hard worker for such a reasonable price. Put yourself in your boss’s shoes – he or she is managing a budget and is always looking for ways to trim. I hate to say it, but as a manager, I will pay as little as an employee will tolerate, because it helps my budget, and might even mean I can afford an extra person. Don’t tell anyone.

On the ethics question I would offer the following: consider the repercussions of sharing information you found on the copy machine. What could happen? Possibly the careless person responsible could be fired. How would make you feel? It could unleash chaos; if everybody revolted and demanded a higher salary it could tank the budget and result in a layoff. Would that be a good thing? One of the best ways to parse an ethical question comes from the book Ken Blanchard wrote with Norman Vincent Peale, The Power of Ethical Management. Would you be pleased to see the story of what you have done pop up as the lead story on Google news? If you say “No!” you have your answer. A good rule of thumb when you think something is borderline is to err on the side of caution.

Once you have considered all of this perspective, if you still feel strongly about it, go talk to your boss. I would say that “demanding” is probably not the best approach, but do be prepared to negotiate hard. Read up on negotiation tips—the internet is bursting with them. Practice with a friend before going in so you feel confident. Also, it would give you leverage to have an offer on the table from a competitor for the salary that feels fair. If your boss agrees with your assessment of your value, great—he can match the offer. If not, you can leave knowing that you used serendipitous information to bravely and ethically stand up for yourself.

Love,

Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!