Do you need to show enthusiasm in front of your manager?

In a hierarchical relationship, a restrained response to a request may be interpreted as a lack of commitment. The useful question is therefore specific: do you need to show your manager enthusiasm you do not feel in order to maintain an effective relationship?

What the literature establishes

Ute R. Hülsheger and Anna F. Schewe (2011, Journal of Occupational Health Psychology) show in a meta-analysis that different forms of emotional labour have different relationships with well-being and performance. Surface acting — changing the visible expression without changing the underlying feeling — is associated with poorer well-being and less favourable job attitudes. These findings do not, however, address enthusiasm displayed towards a supervisor specifically.

The mechanism: changing the expression or the feeling

Alicia A. Grandey (2000, Journal of Occupational Health Psychology) proposes a theoretical framework distinguishing the regulation of emotional expression from the regulation of the feeling itself. Smiling to look convinced and looking for a genuine reason to take an interest in a task are therefore different processes. This distinction supports a hypothesis about hierarchical relationships: a requirement to remain constantly positive may add an effort of emotional regulation to the work being requested.

The premature conclusion

One might conclude that people should always display exactly what they feel. The cited research supports neither that rule nor its opposite, which would make enthusiasm a professional obligation. A calm, respectful and specific response can convey genuine cooperation without simulating emotional buy-in: “I will take responsibility for this request; here is how I plan to proceed.” (our executive and employee training programmes)

What the evidence cannot settle

A substantial part of this literature concerns service occupations and customer interactions, whose demands differ from those of a relationship with a manager. The associations synthesised are not sufficient to establish that occasionally concealing irritation causes exhaustion, or that more authentic expression improves a supervisor’s assessment. In particular, occasional restraint needs to be distinguished from a lasting expectation of good cheer.

A practical check in Lugano

As part of the SHR programme “Building an effective relationship with your manager”, a bank, a fashion or trading business, or an Italian-speaking family SME in Lugano can test an explicit distinction between operational commitment and displayed enthusiasm. For two weeks, within an agreed set of interactions, the employee confirms the action and deadline in Italian, if that is the working language, without adding a compulsory expression of enthusiasm; the pair then records instances in which the manager requested clarification of the employee’s commitment. The measure is the number of these requests divided by the number of relevant interactions, accompanied by a joint review of the wording that raised doubts. This record does not measure exhaustion: it checks locally whether cooperation expressed in a measured way is understood as such. To go further: explore the Building an Effective Relationship with Your Manager training in Lugano in the canton of Ticino, or browse our executive and employee training programmes in Switzerland.

In pictures: Building an Effective Relationship with Your Manager in Lugano

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