Great Manager Newsletter - June 11, 2025
The Broken Workplace Psychological Contract
53%.
53% of managers report feeling burned out. Odds are high that you are one of them or you know one of them.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Fixing this is a huge part of what the Great Manager Community is trying to fix and why I share this newsletter for free.
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1 Big Thing
The Workplace Psychological Contract is Broken
It’s easy to view the debates between company leaders and employees over return-to-office mandates as overreaction on both sides: out-of-touch senior executives who don’t understand that the world has changed versus pampered, entitled, and unmotivated workers. But the fury the debates produce suggests that there is a deeper problem: a shifting psychological contract between employees and employers, and not just about return-to-office policies. This contract—the implicit understanding that employees have about what they owe the company and what the company owes them—is in fact changing. Employers view the contract from an ethics of justice perspective (assuming that if a policy is rationally justified and applied equally to all, it should be accepted), and this ignores real changes in employees’ perspectives on work. These changes, while supercharged by the Covid-19 pandemic, took root decades prior to it. Rather than making decisions through the justice lens, organizations should instead apply an ethics of care lens. This article explains what this lens is and how organizations can use it to repair the employer-employee relationship.
Watch This
How Distributed work can unlock your potential
The option to work from home means that work truly works for everyone, says Avani Prabhakar, chief people officer of a large tech company. She explains how flexibility and asynchronous collaboration in a distributed workplace can unlock diverse global talent, level the playing field for introverts and actually increase productivity — without damaging company culture.
By the Numbers
82%
82% of leaders say this is a pivotal year to rethink core aspects of strategy and operations.
Words of Wisdom
The most effective way to do it, is to do it.
― Amelia Earhart
Business Laughs
Discussion Topics
How do you handle time management and what tips do you have for your team in this regard?
During June, I will be working on a refresh that will be released in July. I really want your feedback on what you like, what you don’t like, and what you would like to see added!
Don’t be shy.