Have you ever had such an experience or confusion:
- Although you have worked very hard and undertaken many important tasks or projects, you have not received the benefits you deserve?
- In the project you and Xiao Ming worked on together, both of you performed well, but your superiors seemed to favor Xiao Ming?
- You are very serious and attentive in doing everything assigned by your superiors, but your superiors seem to be hot and cold towards you, with no new breakthroughs in trust and recognition?
In addition to the above scenarios, have you ever experienced such a mental state:
- Can’t I just try my best to do the things assigned by my superiors and do things beautifully? Why do I have to report all the time? I can do more things when I have reporting time.
- I don’t really want to report to my superiors. Every time I want to report, I feel very entangled in my heart.
- I can’t figure out the management style of my superior. I have reported to him several times, but they have been dismissed. Now I have a psychological shadow when I think of reporting.
- In the first few years after graduation, some things were not done well and I was criticized by my superiors from time to time, which made me more vigilant and nervous, and I was afraid to communicate and report to my superiors.
It is true that whether we are new to the workplace or senior professionals, one of our basic demands is that our hard work can be recognized and affirmed by our superiors.
Harvey McKay, the master of interpersonal relations, said: It is one thing to do your job well, but it is another thing to be recognized by your leader.
Therefore, every one of us in the workplace cannot ignore the importance of upward communication and reporting, let alone think that reporting is not necessary at work. We need to truly realize that reporting itself is work, and reporting is a very important part of the work.
So how can we better communicate and report to our superiors? These 4 points may help you:
1. Overcome your inner heart and take the first step towards upward communication
Has anyone ever thought a lot about it the night before because they had to communicate and report to their superiors? They would do various internal struggles and fall asleep while thinking about it. Then the next day, they originally made up their minds to communicate and report to their superiors. Work came to an abrupt end again. In this way, there was an inner entanglement of not wanting to report.
In fact, most of the time it is because I think too much in my heart. The reason why I think too much is because I am worried that the report will not be good, I am worried that I do not know how to communicate and report to my superiors, I am worried that I will be criticized by my superiors, I am worried that I will not be recognized by my superiors for not having good project results and work performance. And these boil down to the inner fear of superiors and their own lack of confidence.
But in fact, ‘complicated inner activities because you want to communicate and report to your superiors’ are not only meaningless, but will intensify your fear of your superiors.
Therefore, if you think too much, it is better to start by overcoming your own heart and truly take that brave first step. As long as you take this step bravely, you will find a different world. Maybe your superior is not as serious and scary as you think, nor is he as nervous and uncomfortable as you imagined. Instead, I received many other suggestions and opinions that I had not thought of.
Friends who are still struggling and worried about communicating and reporting to the higher level, please make a little preparation, overcome your own heart, and take this step bravely.
2. Get to know your superiors and find suitable communication methods
While overcoming our own inner feelings, we can also be more targeted when communicating and reporting to our superiors.
The superior is selected by the organization and is also a human being. I can understand his value proposition, driving force, work preferences and preferences for subordinates as well as his management style through daily work and communication.
As the saying goes: Only by knowing ourselves and the enemy can we prescribe the right medicine, and only then can we ’take advantage of others.’ This will give you the courage to better communicate and report to your superiors and add weight.
According to DISC Personality Test, the superior’s style can be divided into four types as shown below:
- D - Dominance, a character trait of strong action and result-oriented;
Dominant superiors are natural leaders, and their value orientation is only results-oriented.
Dominant superiors often say: ‘What are the results?’ ‘What are the results?’ ‘The next action is…’ ‘Our goal is…’ ‘How should we do it?’ etc.
A dominant superior always pursues actual results, and only results can bring him the greatest motivation and driving force. Communicating with a dominant superior must be simple, direct, and answer all questions.
If your superior is dominant, what you need to do is:
- 👉When encountering different opinions, do not refute directly, but express your demands tactfully;
- 👉When communicating, the conclusion should come first, be direct and don’t beat around the bush;
- 👉Proactively report everything in detail, so that he can keep track of your situation at any time;
- 👉Be result-oriented. Intermediate conclusions are also staged results. Reports should focus on results, not problems.
- I——Influence (influence/interaction type), a gentle, optimistic and people-oriented personality;
Influential supervisors are outgoing and friendly, and they like to create a relaxed, people-oriented work atmosphere. Such a superior likes to influence others rather than control them. He likes communication and communication, and emphasizes interaction.
When facing influential superiors, you must have a correct attitude. Never think that such superiors understand nothing and do nothing. This type of superior often focuses on big decisions and leaves the specific execution to subordinates. If you promise something, you must keep it.
If your superior is an influencing type, what you need to do is:
- 👉When communicating, you must fully respect and recognize him, and you must actively affirm and recognize the opinions of your superiors;
- 👉When communicating, focus on highlighting the key points of the content and make the logic clear;
- 👉You cannot relax, you need to pay attention to and exercise the power given by your superiors, and implement everything assigned by your superiors.
- S - Steadiness (steady/supportive), a personality trait that focuses on procedures, is rigorous and meticulous in doing things;
The high standard of a stable superior is a perfectionist who pays attention to procedures and logic, is good at analysis and thinking, and pays attention to details.
Steady superiors are mostly represented by technical leaders.
If your superior is a stable type, what you need to do is:
- 👉Strengthen the learning and training of self-expression ability, focus on logical ideas, and present data. It is best to use data and facts to speak;
- 👉Communicate and report the progress of the work more often in any form, but don’t wait until the last minute to report;
- 👉Communicate and seek the opinions of your superiors, listen to his words, respond to his opinions, and make him feel valued.
- 👉Strengthen your knowledge reserve and professional level, because you may be asked questions anytime and anywhere when communicating and reporting.
- C - Compliance (cautious/corrective), a character trait that mainly obeys rules and is willing to support others.
Cautious supervisors are very fond of rules and procedures, pay more attention to details, and maintain high standards. Pay attention to precision in doing things and pay attention to process; have very high quality requirements; be able to truly discuss matters as they arise.
If your superior is cautious, what you need to do is:
- 👉When reporting, be straightforward, discuss things as they happen, talk about them one by one, and avoid rambling;
- 👉When reporting, facts and data must be presented, and clear facts and detailed data must be given;
- 👉When reporting, there must be clear time points and clear plans.
DISC theory divides our emotional behavior into four types, but in actual work and life, we all have these four personalities, but the proportion of each personality is different.
3. Know yourself and your upward communication demands
Why you need to know your own work maturity? This is because each of us has different needs or demands at work. For the superior, he is managing the team, not you alone, and it is impossible for him to have enough time and energy to pay attention to everyone’s detailed development. At this time, we need to communicate and report in a targeted manner based on our own needs or demands and combined with our own work maturity.
Whether you are a new employee or an experienced employee, you will go through four stages of work every time you participate in a new project, but the length of stay in each stage will be different. Correspondingly, the appeals/needs to superiors are different.
Stage 1: High Enthusiasm/Confidence, Low Experience Beginner
When an employee first starts working, generally speaking, he has high enthusiasm for work and relatively high confidence, but lacks experience and low work ability. For such people, we call them ’enthusiastic’ starters. The ideas for communicating with superiors at this stage are as follows:
Stage 2: Medium enthusiasm/confidence, medium ability learners
After an employee puts into work, after a period of time, he begins to understand the environment, gradually adapts to it, and his work ability also improves. However, the initial ’three fires’ of work enthusiasm have also cooled down. The ideas for communicating with superiors at this stage are as follows:
Stage 3: Higher enthusiasm/confidence, higher ability performers.
When an employee is engaged in work and has accumulated considerable experience, his working ability is higher than the average level, but he is accustomed to the environment and his willingness to work fluctuates. The ideas for communicating with superiors at this stage are as follows:
Stage 4: High enthusiasm/confidence, high ability finisher.
When an employee enters a period of stable development, he realizes the value of his work and himself, has a positive and enthusiastic work attitude, enhanced work ability, rich experience, and is able to do his best work. The ideas for communicating with superiors at this stage are as follows:
4. Construct a closed-loop model of upward communication
So when we start to take action and start communicating and reporting upwards, what frequency and what time is the most appropriate? If you report more frequently, your superior will feel that you are constantly disturbing his work; if you report less frequently, your superior will take the initiative to ask you when he needs to know relevant information, and you will feel more pressure at this time.
Therefore, whether we overcome our own hearts and start for the first time, or we know ourselves and our enemies, what we still need to treat carefully is: a review summary based on each upward communication report. This review summary is based on a review Gains and improvement points during the communication and reporting process and after the report is completed.
A closed-loop model of upward communication, please refer to the following:
- Clarify tasks and requirements
That is, when our superiors tell us something, when we receive a task, we do not execute it immediately from the beginning. Instead, we first clarify what the task is, understand the background of the matter, the expectations and goals of the superior, and clarify the tasks and goals we understand. Whether what the superior communicates is consistent.
- Develop a plan and communicate your difficulties correctly
After confirming the task, formulate a plan, evaluate the possible time, predict the possible risks, and reserve buff time.
When a task is challenging or not very accessible, instead of constantly emphasizing that it is ‘difficult to do,’ you might as well change your perspective and use a ‘asking for help’ approach to ask your superiors for the support and resources you need.
For example, your superiors ask you to achieve a performance of 2 million yuan this quarter, but the best performance of the entire team last quarter was only 1.5 million yuan.
If you directly tell your superiors: I don’t have many customers and my customer source channels are also very limited. In addition, the sales skills of the team as a whole are far behind those of my colleagues with the highest performance. It will be really difficult to achieve this goal… etc.
Although these are facts, it is hard to avoid feeling like they are excuses.
If you could rephrase it, for example:
Superior, regarding how to achieve this goal, I plan to start from the following two aspects. I hope you can provide some guidance:
On the one hand, I plan to expand several more channels to increase my potential customers and improve my customer base. I would like to discuss the relevant channels with you…;
On the other hand, I plan to improve my conversion rate by improving my sales skills. I heard that if the sales champion of last year could share with us….
The two statements are actually similar in essence. They just changed the perspective. Did they change from the original negative and pessimistic to positive and move towards the goal?
- Implement the communication and reporting plan
Communicate and report the implementation plan with your superiors. You can formulate an AB plan based on the complexity of the task or matter, and let your superiors make multiple choice questions. Only after reaching a consensus with your superiors can you start implementation.
For example: Regarding the XX plan, I now have three ideas. Solution situation (the first one is…; the second one is…; the third one is…, their advantages and disadvantages are…) + personal analysis (in comparison, I personally recommend , you can adopt the first option because…) + Confirm the plan with your superior (what is your opinion, superior?)
This includes different suggestions and specific analysis, which not only greatly reduces the decision-making burden of your superiors, but also reflects the value of your work.
- Timely and proactive staged feedback
If it is a task with a relatively long time span, then you must take the initiative to provide periodic feedback from time to time, because periodic results are also a report of results, which makes it easier for superiors to grasp first-hand information in a timely manner.
Good feedback consists of four parts: facts (that is, what kind of problems you encountered/progress of the project) + opinions (your own opinions) + follow-up action plans (the solutions you think of must be clear and specific, preferably two or more) + prediction (if your suggestions are followed, what consequences and impacts may there be, both positive predictions and negative predictions must be mentioned)
- Feedback results and confirm opinions
When the task is finally completed, report to the leader in a timely manner and obtain the leader’s opinions.
American management scientist Sean Bell proposed that the core expectations of superiors for subordinates are: communication (active and harmonious), obedience (unconditional), support (comprehensive), effort (complete), attitude (correct) and results. When you can meet all of the above factors, superiors are within your grasp.
Finally, as a workplace, the most fundamental purpose of us communicating and reporting upwards and managing upwards is to do our jobs well, achieve mutual success with our superiors, and achieve a win-win situation.
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