MICROMANAGEMENT IS NOT LEADERSHIP

We have all been there. That one manager who, no matter how well-intentioned, manages to crush your confidence before morning tea. You know the type:

“Let me know when you’ve done it.”

“Cool… now tell me how you’re doing it.”

“Wait, actually... can you share your screen while you do it?”

Just like that, your job transforms from solving problems to narrating your every move like a badly scripted cooking show. If you have ever reported to a micromanager, you know exactly how it feels to slowly lose the will to contribute, and eventually the will to care.

You start your day full of energy, ideas, and that fleeting optimism that maybe today will be different. But 20 minutes in, you are typing while explaining why you are typing. You are asked to justify decisions you have not even made yet. By lunch, you are mentally checked out. By Friday, you are fantasising about a gap year. In Peru. 

Here is what often happens next:

• You propose a solution.

• You are asked to explain how you would approach it.

• Your approach is reworded, rewritten, or re-aligned with the vision.

• You are told, “I trust you. Just use your judgement next time.” (cue internal screaming.)

Sigh…micromanagement is not leadership. It is control and often delivered with a smile that says, “This will only take five minutes” (it never does).

But here’s the twist…it is not about you. Micromanagers are usually overwhelmed, undertrained, and terrified that letting go means something will slip, and they will be the one blamed. So, they tighten their grip and think if they can just watch everything, check everything, and approve everything, then nothing can go wrong. 

The irony is that micromanagement creates the very disasters it is trying to avoid. It creates disengaged, deflated, disempowered teams who stop showing initiative. It fosters frustration, breeds distrust, and makes smart people act like robots. You hire someone for their spark, their fresh thinking, their initiative, and then systematically extinguish every last bit of it by hovering.

Eventually, they stop thinking for themselves. Why would they, when their decisions are always overwritten?

If you are a manager reading this and wondering if this is you…GOOD! Know that this moment of self-awareness is where change begins. Let us talk about what healthy leadership actually looks like:

• Clear expectations set the destination, not every step of the journey. People cannot meet the target if they do not know what it is.

• Real trust gives your team room to do the job you hired them to do. Trust is felt, and it is remembered.

• Coaching check-ins through your 1:1s to ask, not tell. Listen more than you speak. The goal is to grow, not control.

• Safe space to fail so that people learn by trying. If your team is afraid of making mistakes, you will never get innovation, only imitation.

When people feel genuinely trusted, most will repay that trust with ownership and accountability. When they don’t is where your coaching opportunity begins.

If you are currently under a micromanager…first, breathe. It is not you, it is the system they are stuck in, or scared of. Log your wins, track your own growth and keep receipts of how well you are doing (trust me, it helps).

Most importantly, when you step into leadership one day…LEAD DIFFERENTLY. Be the kind of leader who remembers what it felt like to be second-guessed. Be the one who sets people free to do their best, not just prove their worth.

Micromanagement may be common, but it is not inevitable. With the right awareness and support, even the most controlling manager can evolve into someone their team actually wants to follow.