Learn how to say no.

An abrupt no is usually painful to the person to whom it is addressed. What is worse, it can sever a relationship, sever communications. As a rule, a no is necessary in three types of situations:

• an offer of service from a subordinate
• a question asked for the purpose of getting information
• a request intended to produce a favor or benefit If a no is followed by thank you, the offer of service shows the individual your appreciation and will usually conclude the exchange satisfactorily.

A no to the second query is usually a simple matter of fact. But it’s in the third instance, when you have to turn down a request, that trouble appears.

For example, an employee asks, “May I have the afternoon off?” You may have this thrown at you, followed by any one of a number of reasons—a visit to the doctor, special shopping, “personal business,” an early weekend start. Analyze the request and note the three possibilities:

The request may show a poor work attitude.

You’re going to say no, but remember that you’re saying no to the basic attitude as well as the request. Lay your cards on the table. Tell the worker you feel the request isn’t justified, and show that the job rates more attention than it’s getting. And since an attitude of this kind is usually built on a fundamental dissatisfaction, try to find the real cause and discuss it.

The request is justified, but because of the work situation, it must be refused.

Assume that the worker has a good reason for wanting time off, but his absence will mess up your schedule. Or the effect on the rest of your staff will be bad—what you grant to one, you can’t very well refuse to others. You’re going to say no, but you want the worker to see it your way. “No, we can’t spare you this afternoon,” isn’t very satisfactory. Try this: “No, Mary, much as I’d like to, I can’t let you go this afternoon, because. . . .” and from there on be frank. Unlike your worker who has a poor work attitude, Mary is basically conscientious. When you tell her why you’re saying no, she may even go back to her work with a renewed sense of importance—if your explanation plays up her part on the team.

The importance of the reason for the request isn’t clear.

Before saying no, be sure you understand the real reason behind the request. Here’s the same request that calls for two different answers.

1. Frances wants time off to go to the dentist because she has a severe toothache.
2. She wants to go to the dentist to have her teeth cleaned. In the first instance, of course, you say yes.

In the second, you probably say no, and after explaining why, suggest that she make an appointment outside work hours. But this is clearly a case where you have to get the facts first. In general, the simple no, has the sting of a crack across the knuckles. In all cases, no by itself is no answer.

HOW TO BE A “COMER”

“How am I doing?” It’s a question that executives are asked by their subordinates. And for the progress-minded executive, it’s a question he asks himself. A series of questions about you and your job activities constitute a realistic self-audit that can give you an idea of how solidly you are progressing, and help you locate any soft spots in the road:

• Have you recently sat down to assess your knowledge of company policy and the reasons behind it?
• Can you cite specific instances where policy has changed in the last year?
• When is the last time you had to grapple with an ethical question in carrying out your responsibilities?
• Can you describe the traditions of your business?
• Your company has added new equipment, methods, etc. Have you stopped to think what basic implications these changes have for your job?
• The last time you made a comprehensive report, how well were others able to grasp what you were driving at? If they did poorly, was it because of lack of facts? Assumptions and impressions not identified as such? Incomplete examination of alternatives in light of overall effect?
• Have you broken any new ground in the past year, taken on new tasks? If not, why not?
• Did your company make more money last year than the present one? How much of the gain or loss were you responsible for?
• When was the last time you defended the organization against attack from within or without?
• How many proposals did you come up within the last year for new products, procedures, materials, handling personnel?
• And how many of your basic responsibilities do you still handle in the same way you did two or three years ago?
• How often in the past six months have you asked why something is done one way rather than another?
• When is the last time you were in the minority, defending an unpopular proposal in which you believed?

Other observations

Can you recall occasions within the last year when you got upset about your work? If so, was it because something went wrong in an area you deemed important? Was it because somebody else couldn’t see the value of what you were doing? Naturally, this isn’t the kind of self-test on which you can give yourself a score. For one thing, some of the qualities the questions imply are more important to your job than others. But wherever you had trouble answering, or your answer troubled you, you have uncovered an opportunity to sharpen your management skills and strengthen your potential.

How to handle your boss

You can ask the question, “What are good boss relations?” and come up with as many opinions as there are people to answer. To get insight into the ingredients of a satisfactory relationship, it’s helpful to analyze some of the deterrents. To begin with, relations can be too smooth between you and your boss. No matter how excellent a performer you are, a boss can make you muscle-soft by too-easy acceptance of your ideas, incessant approval of your accomplishments. Think back to your school days. Don’t you feel most respect and gratitude toward the teacher who put you over the jumps, but in so doing developed your interest and capabilities in his subject? An examination of many case histories in which both the manager and his boss agreed they got on well together showed these elements:

1. Firstly mutual respect
2. Secondly mutual approval
3. Next mutual stimulation
4. Subsequently a more or less tension-free personal relationship

Why Strains Exist

Certainly, the logic of the subordinate-superior relationship itself cannot explain the frictions that frequently arise. Both parties have every reason to want a good relationship. What forces explain the contradiction? Several possibilities suggest themselves: Difference in standards. One company vice-president stated recently, “The president and I are at loggerheads. His opinion on a major policy matter was so unethical, it ruined my opinion of him irretrievably.” Unacceptable authority. “It’s extremely difficult for me,” said the division manager of a plastics plant, “to take orders from a man I don’t respect.” Feeling of threat. “My boss thinks I’m trying to take over his job,” reports the manager of a bank department.

“Accordingly, the better I do my job, the tougher he becomes.” It’s silly to suggest that the man who has poor relations with his boss is always “doing something wrong.” Obviously, it’s just as possible that the boss is at fault. Yet, you cannot change him. Fortunately, poor relationships can be improved, and good ones can be made even better, by the efforts of the subordinate executive. The aim is to probe the relationship itself.

What Can Be Done?

1. Search for the roots.

The first step when relationships are un-satisfactory is to track down some causes. Many symptoms have standard origins: “My boss is afraid I’m going to take his job.” Whether the difficulty stems from an overly aggressive subordinate who actually has been thinking too big or from a supersensitive boss, the remedy is the same. It’s up to the subordinate to ease off sufficiently to remove the elements of threat. Get time on your side. “My boss doesn’t think much of my abilities.” Regardless of the abilities in question, the subordinate has failed to impress. To reverse the situation, action in two directions is necessary:

a review of past incidents that may have led to such an evaluation

Development of ways to eliminate negative impressions and to build a more favorable evaluation

“I have hostile feelings I can’t altogether cover-up.” It’s common enough, and the last thing called for is a feeling of guilt. But analytical thinking can pinpoint and ameliorate causes. A grievance, real or fancied, may explain the hostility. “Once I got to thinking about it,” reports one “cured” executive, “I realized that I had always resented my boss’s snobbishness.

He came from the right side of the tracks, and I didn’t. Once I dragged that realization out into the day-light, I could properly ask, So what? I even realized it was my attitude rather than his that made the difference seem important. . . .” In addition to healing specific ailing relations, you have other ways to deal with a tough-boss problem that can help make a poor situation good and an impossible one, bearable and constructive.

2. Ask for the tools.

In some cases, the core of an executive’s problem with his boss is simply that the superior expects a particular set of results, without being willing to provide the means for his sub-ordinate to achieve the expected performance. In other words, the superior says, “Here’s what you’ll do,” without completing the plan by adding, “And here’s what I’ll do.”

Specifically, the difficulties may show up in terms like these: “I’m supposed to keep my people informed. But nobody tells me!” “The boss needles me on output, but refuses to discuss maintenance schedules or machine replacement schedules.” The more strongly a superior press for a given result, the more justification there is for a realistic discussion with him of the ways and means by which the result is to be achieved.

3. Selective contact.

“My boss is unreceptive to new ideas,” one executive says. Another complains, “My boss is too demanding.” The explanations for poor relationships, as we’ve already seen, may range all over the lot. But they are based on the unsound assumption that the superior, unlike other people, is a monolithic, one-faceted individual. Often an outstanding quality is singled out as the cause of the friction. But, like any other oversimplification, it hides certain facts. Every person, viewed objectively, has weak and strong points, attrac-tive and unattractive features.

4. Show “the real you.

” Naturally you want your boss to know of your virtues or successful performances, etc. How about your weaknesses? Should you hide them? There are good reasons for not hiding them. Knowing your weaknesses, your superior is in a better position to help you—to back you up in the areas of critical performance.

If you outgrow your handicaps with his aid, he cannot help being favorably inclined toward an improvement in which he has played a part. The boss who has a real feeling for people (and most of them have, you know) wants to know the whole man, strengths and weaknesses both, rather than feel he’s getting only part of the picture.

Certified Personal Competencies for Leadership Skills