Latest / The Difficult Boss Podcast with Fexingo: Managing Up, Toxic Managers, and Workplace Survival / How to Handle a Boss Who Is Never Available for Decisions
Transcript
- Lucas: Luna, I want to talk about a boss who is never available for decisions. Not the micromanager, not the one who changes their mind — the one who simply goes silent when you need a yes or no. Luna: Oh, the ghost boss. You send a message, it sits there for three days. You schedule a 15-minute check-in, it gets pushed three times. Lucas: Exactly. And in the meantime, your work stalls. You can't move forward, you can't commit to the client, you can't release the feature. And the worst part — you start to feel like you're the problem. Luna: Right. Like maybe you're not framing the question well enough, or you're being too needy. But often, it's not you — it's a pattern in how that manager operates. Lucas: Let me give you a real case. I talked to a senior product manager at a mid-size SaaS company — about 400 employees. They were preparing to launch a new pricing tier. The VP of Product had to sign off on the final price point. Simple enough question — $49 per month or $59? Luna: And the VP just… disappeared. Lucas: Went dark for six weeks. Emails unanswered, Slack messages left on read. The PM tried booking time — the VP kept canceling. Meanwhile, the engineering team had already built the feature. Marketing had drafted the launch copy. But nobody could set the price. So the launch got delayed a quarter. Luna: Six weeks for a decision between two numbers. That's not just frustrating — that's costly. What was the VP's deal? Lucas: The PM later learned the VP was overwhelmed — buried in strategic reviews, board prep, and a messy reorg. But they never communicated that. They just went silent. And the team interpreted it as disinterest or incompetence. Luna: So what do you do when your boss is that bottleneck? You can't exactly fire them. And you can't wait six weeks. Lucas: Right. So let's talk about three specific tactics. The first is what I call the 'default yes' agreement. You sit down with your boss — ideally at a calm moment, not when you're waiting on a decision — and you say: 'If I send you a request with clear options and you don't respond within 48 hours, I will proceed with Option A. Is that acceptable?' Luna: That's bold. But it puts the onus on them to opt out, not on you to chase. Luna: And it works best if you frame it as a way to keep the team moving, not as a power grab. Lucas: Exactly. Say something like: 'I want to make sure we don't lose momentum on this project. Would it help if I set a default path forward when I send you these requests?' Most reasonable managers will say yes, because they don't want to be the blocker either. Luna: But what if they say no? Or what if they agree but still don't respond? Lucas: Then you move to tactic two: escalate laterally. Find a peer of your boss — maybe a director in another department who has visibility into the project — and ask them to nudge. Or better, loop in someone who will be impacted by the delay. If the sales team is waiting on that pricing tier, the VP of Sales might be very motivated to get an answer. Luna: That's smart. You're not going over their head — you're bringing in stakeholders who share the pain. Lucas: And the key is to be transparent about it. You can say to your boss: 'I'm going to copy Sarah from Sales on this thread so she can see the timeline. She mentioned the launch is critical for Q3 targets.' That way it's collaboration, not ambush. Luna: What's tactic three? Lucas: Tactic three is the structured async request. Instead of a vague Slack message like 'Hey, what do you think about the pricing?', you send a one-page brief with: the decision needed, two to three options with pros and cons, your recommendation, and a deadline. One page, bullet points, no fluff. Luna: And you send it with a specific ask: 'Please reply with A, B, or C by Friday.' That lowers the cognitive load for them. Lucas: Exactly. The bottleneck boss often isn't malicious — they're overwhelmed. If you can make the decision easier to consume, you dramatically increase the odds of getting a response. In the SaaS case I mentioned, the PM eventually tried a version of this — a single-paragraph email with two options and a bolded recommendation. The VP replied within 90 minutes. Luna: Ninety minutes after six weeks of silence. That's both frustrating and instructive. Lucas: It is. Because it shows the problem wasn't the question — it was the format. The VP needed the decision to be bite-sized. Once it was, they could act. Luna: Okay, but let's talk about the emotional side. When you're constantly waiting on someone who's unavailable, it's easy to feel undervalued. Like your work isn't a priority. Lucas: That's real. And it's a legitimate feeling. But I think it helps to reframe it: the silence is usually about their capacity, not about your worth. That doesn't excuse it, but it can protect you from internalizing it. Luna: Still, there's a limit. At what point do you say 'this pattern is untenable' and start looking for a new team or a new job? Lucas: I think if you've tried structured requests, default-yes agreements, and lateral escalation — and you're still stuck waiting weeks for basic decisions — then yes, it's a systemic problem. And you have to decide whether you can work around it or whether it's time to move on. Luna: Before we wrap, I want to echo something you said earlier about the format making a difference. I've seen this in my own career. I had a boss who would never respond to long emails. But if I sent a two-line Slack with a poll — A or B? — he'd answer in minutes. Lucas: That's a perfect example. You adapted to his communication style without sacrificing your own workflow. And that's really the core skill here: you can't change your boss, but you can change how you present the ask. Luna: Right. And if you've been listening and thinking, 'That sounds great, but my boss is even worse — they're actively hostile when I try these tactics,' then you might need a different strategy altogether. But for the garden-variety unavailable boss, these steps really do work. Lucas: Absolutely. And I want to quickly mention that if this kind of practical career advice has helped you navigate a tough situation or even just feel less alone in it, there's a small way you can support the show. We keep this podcast ad-free by choice, and listener support makes that possible. If you'd like to chip in, you can buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo — all lowercase. That's buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. We appreciate every single contribution. Luna: Yeah, and it goes right back into producing episodes like this one. So thank you to anyone who's ever supported us. Lucas: Alright, so to sum up today: the unavailable boss is often overwhelmed, not malicious. Try the default-yes agreement, structured async requests, and lateral escalation. And if none of that works, it might be time to ask yourself whether the bottleneck is a feature of the organization you can live with. Luna: Or a sign that you've outgrown that environment. Either way, you have more agency than it feels like in the moment. Lucas: Next time on The Difficult Boss Podcast — we're going to talk about the boss who takes credit for your work in meetings. That's one that hits close to home for a lot of people. Luna: Can't wait. Thanks for listening, everyone.