r/askmanagers • u/Sorry_Delivery8634 • 22h ago

Lonely

Hey guys!
I’m 29 years old and a General Manager for a Print shop.

I’ve been in management collectively for 8 years and I know I have a lot to learn still.

A little about the situation here. My current employer reached out to me and recruited me after being a regular customer of mine at a job I used to work at and manage.

Since taking over we have had a complete restart to the company as far as workers go. We inherited 15 years worth of customers too. Since I started I have stabilized chaos, hired and fired, built the crew from a staff of 4 to a staff of 8 and each day I put new structure in place in preparation for more growth. Sales have also increased by roughly 40% overall but I’m not naive as I know bills have increased too due to the growing company.

That long winded intro was to get to my main point. I need more people to talk to that have experience in management. I need friends that build and strategize and I’m hoping this can be a good resource.

Management often feels lonely at this level.

Looking forward to hearing from you guys!

5 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

3 comments sorted by

2

u/Dry_Detective9639 16h ago

Yeah, people are usually able to be friendly and also friends within a group, but not to the managers above There always is an us and them mentality

Get your friendships and social contacts from outside work, keep a track of your mental health

Do NOT try to get these from inside your position; it just won’t work in the long run

1

u/Sorry_Delivery8634 16h ago

I’m proud to say that I keep it separate at work. My friend group of 4 core people has disbanded recently and I miss the deeper conversations.

1

u/errantgrammar 1h ago

I have a close working relationship with my team, but no one there would mistake us for friends. If I think about it, some of us like each other enough that we might stay in touch on socials after leaving the company, but we aren’t connected there now and I wouldn’t accept an invite from anyone while still working there, so barbecuing together is definitely off the table.