Something to readWorking with your manager
Staying aligned with authority
A 5-minute essay on why a senior title brings borrowed authority, and how to keep it
Why it’s worth your time
A bigger title can look like the end of asking permission, and Will Larson argues it comes with a catch: authority you keep only while you stay close to the person who lent it. He offers three practical habits for staying aligned with your manager without giving up your own view.
Never surprise your manager
The essay · 5 min · Free
Opens their site. We don’t copy it here; we’d rather they get the read.
- Read the essay.
Read for the three habits in the middle section: never surprising your manager, not letting them surprise you, and feeding them context. Then read his closing point about moving leaders gradually.
- Tell your manager one thing first.
Before your next 1:1, write down one thing your manager might otherwise hear from someone else this week: a slip, a frustrated team, a decision you made. Tell them first, in a line or two, with what you're doing about it.
Good moments for this: before a 1:1when you step into a senior roleafter a reorg
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Making it work for you
Every workplace is different. Here’s what to think about before you start, and what might get in the way.
Things to think about
Larson writes for senior engineers, but being blindsided by news from your own area tends to cost trust at any level, and so does leaving your manager to explain something they hadn't heard about.
What might make this harder
Make the flow easier from your side: send a short weekly note of what you're focused on, and ask in your 1:1 whether anything else should be on it.
Questions people ask
What is Staying aligned with authority about?
A 2020 essay by Will Larson for engineers moving into staff-plus roles. It argues that the authority of a senior title is lent by your manager and sponsors, and that keeping it depends on staying closely aligned with them.
What does it mean to never surprise your manager?
Keeping your manager from being caught off guard by news about your work, ideally by telling them first. Larson calls surprises the fastest way to destroy a manager's trust and suggests treating each one as something to learn from.
Is managing up a bad thing?
Larson separates a destructive kind, hiding problems or controlling information, from managing up as cutting the friction between you and your manager. He argues for the second.
How do I influence senior leaders without overstepping?
Stay close to them, keep them informed, and move them toward your view a step at a time. In Larson's account, steady influence only works if you keep your place in the conversation.
What it says, and how it holds up
Will Larson calls it a misconception that a senior role means you finally get to do things your way. The authority that comes with a title is loaned by the people above you, and it can be taken back. In this 2020 essay, a draft guide for staff-plus engineers, he argues that keeping it means staying closely aligned with whoever lent it, usually your direct manager.
He leans on two images Rick Boone used for his advisory role at Uber: Game of Thrones' Hand of the King, and The West Wing's Leo McGarry, who serves at the pleasure of the President. Then come the habits. Don't surprise your manager, which he says destroys trust faster than anything. Don't let them surprise you either; if information doesn't flow down, build your own channel. And pass them context from the wider organization as information rather than a problem to solve.
It's easy to read the essay as advice to defer, and fair to ask whose interests a rule against surprising the boss mostly serves. Larson's closing argument pulls the other way. He grants that adopting a senior leader's vision works for some, but recommends keeping your own, noticing where your values differ from the organization's, and advocating without getting thrown out of the room. His case is that you keep your own view and pace how hard you push it.
Because the authority is borrowed, it rises and falls with the lender. If your manager's own standing is slipping, or they're on their way out, aligning only with them ties your influence to theirs. That's a time to build relationships with their peers and the person above them as well, openly rather than around them.
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Picked by Truest and described in our own words. The original belongs to its creator. Last updated October 9, 2026. We sell a career membership; where that’s relevant above, we say so.