SmartPulse — our weekly nonscientific reader poll in SmartBrief on Leadership — tracks feedback from more than 160,000 business leaders. We run the poll question each Tuesday in our e-newsletter.
Last week, we asked: How well do your bosses stay in touch with your day-to-day reality?
- Extremely well — They completely understand what I go through: 5.23%
- Very well — They understand most of what I go through: 14.24%
- Well — They’re up to speed on the big things but not the little ones: 36.07%
- Not very well — They’re a bit out of touch with my situation: 28.18%
- Poorly — They live in an ivory tower: 36.02%
Our bosses are out of touch? It’s interesting that the majority of you said your bosses are out of touch with your reality because in last week’s SmartPulse I asked how well you stay in touch with your team members’ reality and the vast majority of you said you’re very much in touch. It’s pretty amazing to see the perception bias and gap between these perspectives. Sure, our assessments of our own skills are always rosy, hence the bias. I encourage you to take the time to get a candid assessment of how your teams would answer this question about you. Or you can simply take these steps to make a pointed effort to better stay in touch with your team’s reality.
Mike Figliuolo is managing director of thoughtLEADERS and author of “One Piece of Paper: The Simple Approach to Powerful, Personal Leadership.”