Don’t Complain To Your Boss — Do This Instead

Workplaces can feel like a complex maze full of challenges and obstacles—especially for employees who have grievances to voice to their boss. You might think that a straightforward approach is the best approach when it comes to complaints (clarity is kindness, after all), but beware: that’s not always true. Voicing your concerns without strategic tact could be detrimental to your career.

The Pitfalls of Direct Complaints

Direct complaints generally place blame on a person or situation, without any creative thinking about constructive ways forward. It can sound like: “This just isn’t working,” “Mary is really getting in my way,” or “John did this to me.” Launching into issues without offering solutions can give the impression that you are a disgruntled, non-proactive employee. It can also give the impression that you are short-sighted and lack the ability to engage in long term, strategic thinking. Lodging frequent complaints to a manager can unfortunately result in decreased peer and supervisory support, too. It may also have a negative impact on your colleagues’ morale. While it is important for managers to be cognizant of challenges faced by their team members, unbridled and continuous criticism has the potential to unwittingly damage your professional relationships and career trajectory.

Adopting a Solution-Oriented Approach

Use a proactive, solution-oriented strategy when voicing concerns to your manager. This can significantly enhance your professional image. A framework such as Situation-Behavior-Impact (SBI), followed by suggesting solutions to the problem (SBI-S), can make an enormous difference. Try the following:

1. Situation: Detail the situation to your manager using clear, concise and objective language. Try to stick to facts. So, you might say, “We have been troubleshooting the software issue with Jane’s team.”
2. Behavior: Trying to stay as neutral as possible, describe the problematic behavior, circumstance or system getting in the way. You might say, “However, we’re experiencing some pushback from the team in the form of missed deadlines, lack of responses to emails, and some negative comments in meetings.”
3. Impact: Now, detail the impact of the situation and behavior. You can say, “It’s making our team feel frustrated about missing deadlines and I can see it affecting morale. We feel powerless to get this done and we know how crucial it is for the business.”
4. Suggestions: Now, here comes the crucial step. First, tell your manager you have some constructive suggestions. Ask if he or she is open to hearing them. Pause. If you get the green light to proceed, present your suggestions. You can say, “I think the issue is that Jane misunderstands her team’s responsibility here. It may help to get Jane and our senior leadership on a call to clearly specify what’s expected of everyone.”

Engaging in Constructive Problem Solving

Instead of complaining, try to engage in constructive problem solving. This will substantiate your commitment and value to the organization. When we feel empowered to solve problems at work, we experience a greater level of pride in what we do, a higher level of job satisfaction, and often, improved job performance.

Cultivating a Positive Professional Image

Problem solvers are seen as invaluable; complainers are seen as dispensable. When you commit to being part of a solution, you are bolstering your professional image. Try focusing on solutions the next time you identify an issue at work using the SBI-S framework, and watch how the reception changes.