One of the biggest challenges in the corporate world is what to do if you have an incompetent boss. Many people lose sleep over this kind of issue, as it can be a big threat to your own wellness and wellbeing at work if your boss is apt to make mistakes. It can also cause you professional embarrassment, particularly if your boss’s mistakes are going to impact on your own workload.
If you feel that your boss is incompetent, the first thing to work out is whether there is a conflict of personalities between the two of you. For example, is she not passing on work to you that she should be delegating, and then finding herself overwhelmed? Could this mean that she doesn’t trust you and so attempts to take on too much herself? If you think that this could be the case, talk openly to your boss and work out ways that you could gain her trust. If she delegates more readily, she will be able to focus more on her own workload.
It’s also worth having a think about your boss’s strengths and weaknesses. Although it may seem that your boss is totally incompetent, it’s rare for someone to be high up in a company if they have absolutely no skills, so have a think about things that she may be good at that have allowed her to get where she is today. Think too about her weaknesses, as this will allow you to identify what it is about your boss that makes her work seem below par. This will help the way you think about her, and allow you to think things like ‘she’s not incompetent, she’s just bad at XYZ’.
Finally, if you really feel that your boss is incompetent and that it is going to impact on you, start writing everything down. If it all blows up, it will be good to have a log of what happened and when, and exactly who was involved, so that you can defend yourself if the blame ever comes your way.
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