I recently saw this question on LinkedIn:
My boss won’t listen to me – what do I do?
In case you are having a conflict with your boss – let’s say, you [want to go one way] (and you are sure that this is the best for the company) and he wants to go the other – familiar, regular way… What do you do? I tried to show him all the ups of my new solution but he simply won’t have it and I don’t want to go behind his back… What do I do?
The following was my brief response:
There are a few ingredients necessary to get people to try something new: Discomfort with the familiar, regular way; a clear vision of where to go instead; and practical, doable steps to move forward. It sounds like you have been focusing on all the ups of the new solution – on your vision for the future. But if your boss sees no reason to move away from the current way of doing things, or if he doesn’t see how to move forward successfully, then he will be stuck there, no matter how great your proposed solution is. Here are a couple of resources that would also help you identify ways to influence your boss:
99 Ways to Influence Change
How to Deal With a Clueless Boss
I was surprised that a short while after posting my response, the question was removed from LinkedIn because users had reported it as inappropriate. Huh?!? It’s common for employees to feel like their boss isn’t listening, especially to new ideas. Anyway, I thought I would post the question and my response here, since it was removed from LinkedIn!
What do you do when you feel like your boss isn’t listening to you?
Interesting post. For me, that question is not completely inappropriate. Some bosses, like managers or department heads, may not want to take ideas from their employees, because it may show that their employees are better than them. But since you are on a team, your boss should still listen to what you have to say, especially if it would benefit the whole company.
Thought-provoking post. I’ve found that it’s very difficult to change someone’s behavior but that we can still do things to set a positive example and create a healthy work environment. These might include providing workplace communication training for everyone that focuses on team building or collaborative problem solving. The idea is to provide the boss an alternative route and make them part of creating a new communication culture. It also helps to model positive behaviors.