Much has been written on the topic of coaching employees. (One of my favorites is a book we published a few years ago by Daniel Harkavy. It is called Becoming a Coaching Leader: The Proven System for Building Your Own Team of Champions.) But very little has been written on the topic of coaching your boss.

The truth is that most employees see things that their boss says or does that are ineffective or inefficient. Sometimes, they see these things more clearly than anyone else. The boss could profit greatly from the insight of his or her subordinates—if only they could get honest feedback.

Recently, I wrote about how leaders must learn to handle criticism and overlook offenses. I think this is the number one way that leaders can get derailed and rendered ineffective.

A few days ago, I ran into a story in reading the Desert Fathers, that illustrated the point beautifully:

As a leader, you are going to draw fire. People will criticize you. Some will second-guess your decisions. Others will impute motives that aren’t there. A few will falsely accuse you.

For example, just a few weeks ago, someone wrote a blog post, publicly calling me a hypocrite. I won’t lie: it stung. I was tempted to respond in kind. Thankfully, I didn’t.

If you speak, write books, or blog, you will get criticism. It is inevitable. I have certainly had my share. I’d like to say that my skin has gotten thicker with age, but it hasn’t. Criticism still stings.

As you may recall, I am mentoring a group of eight young men. We meet once a month for three hours, using the excellent program from Next Generation Mentoring. In between sessions, we all read an assigned book, memorize a verse of Scripture, and complete other homework assignments.

As a leader, it seems that no matter what you do, a few people will find fault. Even if you were standing on a corner, handing out free money, someone would complain.

• “What about the people that didn’t know you were going to hand out free money? You’re not being fair.”
• “You’re not giving away enough to make a difference!”
• “You’re encouraging laziness!”