Managing up when your manager is absent (or chaotic)

 

our VP is: Always in firefighting mode Avoiding hard decisions Giving vague feedback like “keep doing what you’re doing” Changing priorities every two weeks Or worse… politically fragile and protecting themselves   And now you’re stuck.   No clear KPIs. No aligned expectations. No real feedback. No advocacy. Just ambiguity and hope.   If you’re ambitious, this is not just frustrating. It’s dangerous.   Because the longer you operate without clarity, the more you start managing for survival instead of for promotion.   And here’s the uncomfortable truth: At the Director and Sr. Director level, you no longer get to wait for clarity.   You have to manufacture it. Let me show you how.

The Hidden Risk of Working Without Clear Leadership When leadership above you is messy, three things quietly happen:   1. Your Goals Become Guesswork Without clearly defined KPIs or agreed-upon outcomes, you start optimizing for activity instead of impact.   You overwork. You over-deliver. You try to cover every angle.   But when review season comes, you struggle to articulate what “winning” actually meant. And if success was never clearly defined, it’s very hard to prove you achieved it.   2. Your Feedback Loop Breaks If your manager avoids conflict or doesn’t give constructive input, you lose calibration.   You don’t know: Where you’re strong. Where you’re misaligned. Whether you’re operating at executive altitude.   Over time, this creates self-doubt or false confidence. Neither is helpful.   3. Your Promotion Path Becomes Fragile If one unstable leader controls your narrative upward, your career becomes dependent on their competence and political strength.   That’s not strategic. That’s risky. And the longer you tolerate it, the more it looks like you need it.   How to Lead Effectively When Your Manager Doesn’t When your manager is absent or chaotic, your job changes. Not officially. But in reality.   You stop being someone who waits for direction. You become someone who creates operating stability.   Here’s what that actually looks like.   1. Create Clear KPIs and Success Metrics Instead of Waiting for Them The cost of waiting: You drift. You stay busy. You ship things. You’re moving a million individual parts, but not the ship.   That means you don’t have leverage. And when promotion conversations happen, you can’t clearly point to what you were actually hired to win, even though your calendar is exploding.   If success is vague, your impact will be too.   Instead of asking: “What are my goals?” Propose them.   For example: “Based on where the company is headed and what our function actually controls, here are the four outcomes I believe we should own over the next two quarters. If we hit these, we move revenue, cost, or risk in a real way. Does this align?”   Notice the shift.   You’re not asking for direction. You’re offering a clear path and just asking for confirmation. It works because it takes off some of the pressure. Your manager doesn’t need to come up with the answers, just approve your direction.   But, how do you come up with a plan when there’s ambiguity and little direction? Tie your KPIs to business outcomes, not activity. Pick 3–5 real results, not a laundry list of tasks. Be explicit about trade-offs so it’s clear what won’t get done. Follow up in writing so expectations are documented.   This isn’t overstepping. It’s removing guesswork. And executives trust people who remove guesswork.   2. Build Your Own Information Flow to Reduce Political Blind Spots The cost of waiting for information to trickle down: If information from the top is inconsistent, you operate with half the story.   Then you get surprised. Then you look reactive.   When your manager is chaotic or doesn’t share information, you have to find other ways to get informed. That means building lateral intelligence. Strong relationships with peer Directors. Regular alignment conversations that aren’t just status updates. Smart, neutral questions like: “What themes are you hearing from the top right now?” “Anything shifting that could affect our roadmap?”     At senior levels, context is everything. The people with context make better decisions. The people without it look like they lack judgment. Don’t be the second one.   3. Design a Visibility Strategy That Doesn’t Depend on One Person The cost of relying only on your manager to advocate for you: If they don’t talk about you, you don’t exist.   And if they’re politically cautious, insecure, or just overwhelmed, you become invisible by default. That’s too risky.   You need a visibility plan that goes beyond your manager.   Here are a few things you can do: Send structured updates that tie your work to business outcomes Share progress in exec-facing forums when appropriate Document impact in writing (use before and after to show impact)   Instead of: “We completed the migration.” Say: “This initiative reduced operational risk by X%, improved time-to-market by Y%, and sets us up to support next year’s growth.”   Same work. Different altitude.   Visibility at this level isn’t about being loud. It’s about being clear on why your work matters.   4. Protect Your Promotion Path This is the uncomfortable one.   If your entire promotion path depends on one VP’s advocacy, you are exposed. That’s a single point of failure.   And when leadership is unstable, that risk goes up.   So you diversify credibility. Build real trust with multiple senior stakeholders. Own cross-functional work that puts you in higher-level conversations. Make sure your skip-level knows you for judgment and outcomes, not drama.   You are not bypassing your manager. You are protecting your future. There’s a difference.   The Emotional Trap to Avoid When Managing Up When your manager is absent or chaotic, resentment builds fast.   You think: “I shouldn’t have to do this.” “This is literally their job.” “This isn’t fair.”   All true, but irrelevant.   Staying in that mindset keeps you reactive. And reactive leaders rarely get promoted.   The people who rise in messy environments aren’t the ones who complain the most.   They’re the ones who quietly create order. They clarify. They connect dots. They bring structure where there isn’t any.   And over time, everyone starts to feel the difference. That is what managing up well really means.

Your Next Step: A 30-Minute Stabilization Exercise This week, pick the area where ambiguity is costing you the most: Unclear KPIs No real feedback Political blind spots Weak visibility   This week, define one area where expectations feel vague and draft the version you would operate under if you were already the VP. Send it for alignment. That’s how you stop being managed and start being seen as executive material.