Sometimes managers will tell me when they start trying to take a more hands-on approach with their employees, their employees will push back. A manager might start trying to spell out expectations, go over "Here's what I want you to do, here's how I want you to do it. Are you with me? Are you sure?" And the employee will push back and say, "Hey, don't tell me how to do my job, don't micromanage me, don't you trust me?" What's a manager supposed to say to that? Here's what I tell managers. You need to say, "I'm not micromanaging you, I'm just plain managing you. I'm spelling out expectations; I'm making sure that you know what to do and how to do it. That's not micromanaging; it's just plain managing and sorry, that's my job. I'm your manager."

When managers try to impose negative consequences on employees, sometimes the employee will push back and say, "It's not fair, that's not fair." So, what's a manager suppose to say? Well, how about this: "Gee, let's go over in detail exactly what concrete actions you took and how they led to what outcomes and how these outcomes are directly related to the concrete actions you took."

What about when a manager tries to reward one employee more than another? The other employees might come and say, "You're favoring Mary." And what should you say? You say, "I'm glad you noticed! Let me tell you why I favor Mary. Because Mary comes in early, she leaves late, she dots her i's, she crosses her t's, she jumps through hoops, she bends over backwards, when I ask her to do something she does it, when I don't ask her to do something, she figures out what to do and she does it anyway. How would you like to be my favorite today?" That's what I think you should say. What about when the employee says, "Hey you're picking on me." Same thing: "I'm so glad you noticed. Let me tell you why I'm picking on you. Because you're not doing any work!"