If you manage the micros, the macros will manage themselves
When I first spoke with my current line manager, after he joined the company, he assured me that he's not a micromanager. If that's true, then he certainly demonstrates micromanaging tendencies. Is there anyone more pathetic and less inspiring than a man, or woman, with a tracking spreadsheet? I think it's a sign of insecurity, or not having enough real work to keep them gainfully occupied.
Perhaps he really thinks that he's helping me by asking bloody stupid questions, the answers to which he clearly doesn't comprehend, just so that he can update his damned spreadsheet. Repeatedly. It's like dealing with a three-year-old child. After a while, I just let him think and add whatever he likes to his spreadsheet, for I giveth a shit not.
I'm gonna call a spade a spade. He's a micromanager, whether or not he believes otherwise.
He doesn't really understand what I do, which is why I'm doing it and he isn't. That's fine, I don't know whatever the hell it is he does either—other than irritating the tits off of me—and I don't care, as long as he leaves me alone.
He's the third Почемучка (pachemuchka) of my entire career. All three of them have been during my tenture at MegaCorpCH. And the other two are Chinese.
In my experience, Chinese managers are the worst. They exhibit a two-faced gatekeeping mentality; more of a boss
mindset than that of a leader. It might stem from the fear of losing face and appearing to not be in control, especially to higher management. Whatever, their only interest was for me to explain my work to them, so that they could look good when they presented it upwards, even when they understood so little that they actually gave the wrong message.
Beyong fucking upwards, their time is largely spent on useless HR processes that everyone, except HR, could well do without. It adds nothing of value.
Organisations that accept, and foster, such piddling middle-management deserve to fail.
Shit bags! That's them, not you, gentle reader.