Why my 1-year-old is the worst middle manager (and what it taught me about toddler behavior)
The first time I realized my son was a middle manager was during breakfast. He pointed at the banana bowl. I got up, took a banana, and held it out. He looked at me with the kind of disappointment that could wilt a houseplant. Then he pointed at the banana bowl again. I put the banana back. He nodded. Then he pointed at the banana bowl again. I took the banana out. He burst into tears.
I stood there holding a banana, unsure if I had just been promoted or fired.
This has become a pattern. My one-year-old does not eat food. He directs it. He points, I retrieve, he reconsiders, I put back, he screams, I try again with the wrong hand, and eventually he accepts a cracker he rejected five minutes earlier. It is exhausting. It is also, I’ve slowly realized, remarkably similar to working under a middle manager who has no actual authority but an extremely clear vision.
He delegates constantly. He will hand me his sippy cup, then watch my every move as I unscrew the lid, like he expects me to cut corners. If I open it the wrong way, he pushes it back. If I open it correctly, he still stares at me with mild suspicion. He is not grateful. Gratitude is not in his job description. His job is to make sure the floor stays dirty, the remote control is within grabbing distance, and that no one, ever, puts him in the high chair before he is ready.
I have never checked in with a boss as often as my son checks in with me. He will crawl to the kitchen, stop, look back at me, and point to the fridge. I get up. By the time I reach him, he has already changed his mind and crawled to the Tupperware drawer. This happens twelve times an hour. He is never in the same place as the project he is managing. He is a classic overworked supervisor: assigning tasks, changing priorities, and nowhere near the actual work.
At first I thought something was wrong. I’d read about the terrible twos, but this was the terrible fourteen months. Then I started watching him more carefully, and I realized he wasn’t being difficult. He was being strategic in the only way he knows how.
At one year old, he has a clear mental image of how the world should be. The blue spoon should go in the yogurt. The yogurt should go on the tray. The tray must be wiped in a particular direction. The door to the pantry should be open just enough for him to peek in but not enough for me to see what he’s doing. He has all these plans, but he can’t execute them. His hands are still learning how to pinch a Cheerio. His legs are still figuring out how to turn corners. So he needs me to do the physical work. But he’s not ready to hand over the decision-making.
That’s what being a middle manager is, I think. You have responsibility without full control. You have to get things done through other people, but you don’t get to make the final call. And when the people above you change their minds, you’re the one who has to adjust. My son is that person. The banana is his direct report. And I am his incompetent HR department.
The practical side of parenting a one-year-old feels a bit like learning to work for a new boss every hour. You can’t reason with him. You can’t negotiate. You can’t explain that the apple and the banana are basically the same fruit. But you can change how you respond.
I’ve started saying what he might be feeling, even when he can’t say it himself. When he cries because I peeled the banana wrong, I say, “You wanted the banana, and then you didn’t. That’s confusing.” It doesn’t always calm him down, but it helps me remember that he’s not crying to annoy me. He’s genuinely upset that the world didn’t match the version in his head.
I also try to give him small, real choices. Not “What do you want to eat?” because that’s too open. At his age, too many options shuts down the whole system. Instead, I hold up two things: the banana or the pear. “Pick one.” He’ll point or reach, and we go with that. Sometimes he points at the banana, and then when I open it he points at the pear, and we start over. But at least I’ve given him a sense that he has some say in the matter. That was probably what he wanted all along.
I’ve also learned to avoid questions that invite a “no.” If I ask, “Should we go to the car?” the answer is always no. He has never once said yes. So now I say, “Let’s go to the car. I’m going to open the door. You can hold the keys.” He doesn’t have to agree. He just gets a job. And like most middle managers, he prefers having a job to having a discussion.
There are still moments when I want to quit. This morning he assigned me to open a box of raisins, and then, before I could hand it to him, he crawled away to inspect the electrical outlet. I knelt there holding the open raisins, waiting for further instructions. He did not return. A few minutes later he crawled back, took the box, dumped it on the floor, and looked over at me like I’d made a logistical error.
But I’ve started to see what’s underneath the chaos. He isn’t trying to make my life harder. He’s trying to make his life more predictable. The world is huge and loud and confusing. There are doors that open and close, people who leave the room, and spoons that feel cold. Controlling the small stuff—the placement of the blanket, the direction of the sippy cup, the location of the banana—is how he holds on. He may be a terrible middle manager, but he’s also a very small person doing his best to manage something that feels unmanageable.
I don’t think this phase has a clean ending. He’ll grow out of the screaming, probably, but he’ll grow into other things. The same kid who insists on the blue spoon will one day insist on wearing shorts when it’s twenty degrees outside. The same need for control will look different as he gets older. For now, I’m just trying to be the kind of employee he can trust. I show up. I take direction. I don’t cry when he fires me.
He’s still a terrible middle manager. But I’m starting to get used to his management style. And honestly, sometimes he’s right. The blue spoon was the right spoon. I just hadn’t asked.
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