Allie's Story

Allie graduated with a B.S. in electrical engineering and a passion for an area of EE called power systems. Her bubbly personality and feminine appearance made her look very different from most other engineers, although her qualifications and capability to do the job were on par with her co-workers. In her first job, the pressure and deadlines of the job dominated and pulled the team together regardless of individual personalities on the team. In her second job, however, things did not go as smoothly. Here is Allie's story.



What's going on here?

For whatever reason, Allie's manager believed that her personality would hold her back from advancing in the company. This belief seems to have led the manager to play an active role in holding Allie back by refusing to provide recommendations for positions in other groups within the company and by limiting her opportunities to grow her skills and take a break (vacation). Allie's "failure" to change her personality also seems to have escalated the manager's dislike of her. And the manager responded by restricting her opportunities even further.

What should be going on here?

Most managers dislike an employee at some time or another. The responsibility for handling that dislike, however, lies squarely on the manager as the person in power in this relationship. The manager appears to be making the classic mistake of lecturing Allie in an attempt to coach her to greener pastures. Instead, he should be using an interview style to draw her out and reduce her resistance to potential change. In this process, he would also have an opportunity to listen to her side of the story and perhaps, lessen his dislike and cultivate trust in his relationship with her. Instead, his insistence on focusing on what he dislikes along with his biased treatment of her (by refusing her opportunities granted to others in the group) undermine Allie and limit her potential to grow and move beyond tense exchanges with her manager.

How can we Change the Story?

While Allie originally thought that good old fashioned perseverance would carry her through her manager's increasingly entrenched and negative views of her, Allie eventually recognized that she was turning into an employee who had become stuck in one place and unable to move on. Seeing this, she recognized her only option was to leave the company. And, so she did, moving on to another company where her new manager did not impose these same barriers to promotion and advancement.

No doubt, her manager should have changed his management style to incorporate more effective techniques for managing an employee he did not like. However, since he seemed more interested in lecturing Allie than hearing her side of the story or input, it was not possible for Allie to meaningfully influence his views and decisions. While Allie did speak with her manager's manager as well as human resources regarding this situation, she was not able to make headway with either. Given the power the manager had over her opportunities for growth, transfer, and advancement, Allie had little choice but to resign and seek another job.

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