The context is I work at a mid-market PE in a relatively small firm. I am an analyst at the firm and the office culture has been great so far. However, I am having issues working with one of the new principals. He asks for research without stating a clear objective and provides guidelines which are very vague in general. I try to go the extra distance by providing additional research and insights which might be helpful. The part where things become complicated is he will criticize me when I do the things he asks for, as well as when I go the distance. He will make it known that the research was not what he asked for and call it incomplete. I usually write down instructions when talking to seniors to ensure I don't miss something. But this guy seems to change his requirements out of the blue. After a few back and forth, he will settle on a structure which is simple and had he stated the structure and objective clearly I could have done the work easily. I understand that he might not initially have a clear idea of what he wants, but sending me to work on X and expecting Z is straight up annoying.
I don't mind doing the work but this lack of direction and structure is frustrating me. Wanted to know if this an industry thing or a style issue with the principal or am I missing something?
This kind of stuff is always really annoying. The easiest thing to try is to confirm what he is looking for at the outset. Next time he asks you for a research request, confirm if x,y,z is what he's looking for or if there is something else that would be helpful. Relatedly, look back at some of his previous comments and see if there are any patterns as it relates to the type of research he usually likes
Thanks for the response man. Yeah, I will just follow your advice. Truth is despite his lack of clarity the principal is genuinely nice as a person. I wonder if there are people who do this intentionally.
Your problem is common across industries and it may be a good opportunity to dramatically raise your game as an analyst and communicator. I'll share with you a process I developed to deal with a new boss with unfamiliar expectations, and I've found it to be a very useful habit in general for improving presentation and organizing information.
If you're not sure what kind of work product he wants, take a few minutes after (or even better: while) talking with him and just sketch out on a sheet of paper a graphical representation or schematic of what you think he wants. Make it visual if you can. He wants to know what the market size is, you hand sketch for him a pie chart or a waterfall or a step-down showing a broader market and moving down to what's addressable, yadda yadda. Doesn't need to be pretty or specific: keep it generic. If he wants detail on how big the competitors are in the TAM, you can annotate that. Maybe he wants a model: sketch a quick schematic of inputs, outputs and maybe a description of the method.
Then SHOW him the schematic and annotate any changes he wants. Pretty soon you might get good at this and will understand his requirements better. Eventually you'll be able to dispense with the sketch method completely, but you may find it useful for your own purposes.
+1 to this ... not only does this show your boss how you're thinking about it and gives them confidence in you doing the work, it gives you a great visual to remember exactly how that conversation went. Sometimes writing while taking instruction can ingrain those words more than you think.
You are absolutely right. I took this as a learning opportunity to become a better communicator. I used your process right after seeing your reply. And guess what, that made things a lot clearer. So my process was a bit modified. I laid out the structure for the research on excel and walked the principal through my thought process and asked for feedback. He added a couple more points and made my life a shit ton easier. So once again man, thanks a bunch!
Amazing comment. Had a similar experience to what OP described, and am sure I will run into the same situation in the future. Thanks so much for this suggestion.
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