You know the look. You walk into a room and they clock you for half a second longer than everyone else. They're professional, technically, but there's a coolness there that wasn't there before. They were in the running for your role, or they expected to be, and now they have to report to you instead.
This is one of the more uncomfortable management situations because nothing is openly broken. They're not insubordinate. They haven't done anything you can address directly. They're just... not quite with you. And you can feel it.
The instinct for most managers is to win them over. Validate their experience, talk up how much you value them, give them extra visibility on projects. Show them you're not a threat. The problem is that this approach reads as insecurity, and it rarely works — because the issue isn't whether they like you. It's that their professional identity took a hit, and no amount of goodwill from you is going to fix that.
What actually helps is treating it as a clarifying conversation you've been putting off.
Not a confrontation. Not a feelings check-in. A straightforward professional conversation about the reality of the situation and what it means for how you'll work together. Something like: "I know you were interested in this role. I want to acknowledge that directly, because I think it makes sense for us to talk about it rather than work around it. How are you feeling about things?"
Most managers never have this conversation. They hope the awkwardness fades on its own. Sometimes it does. Often it calcifies into something harder to fix.
When you open the door, one of two things happens. Either they take the opportunity to clear the air — express some frustration, feel heard, and start to move on — or they tell you everything is fine, which at least gives you a clean reference point for the future. Neither outcome is worse than the silence you were sitting with.
What you're establishing in that conversation is the working relationship, not the emotional one. You're not asking them to be your friend or to feel good about the situation. You're signaling that you see them clearly, that you're not going to manage them gingerly because of the history, and that you expect the same professionalism in return. That's the implicit message underneath a direct conversation, and most people receive it.
After that, manage them the same way you'd manage anyone else. Give them real work, real feedback, and real opportunities — not compensatory ones. Sympathy projects and unnecessary visibility are patronizing, and sharp people know when they're being managed around rather than managed.
If the behavior crosses a line — undermining you in meetings, venting to colleagues about the decision, subtle resistance that affects the team — that's a performance conversation, not a feelings conversation. "I've noticed X, and it's not working. I want to understand what's going on" is a straightforward opening. Gallup research consistently shows that unaddressed interpersonal friction on teams compounds over time, dragging down performance well beyond the two people involved. The longer you let it go, the more it costs.
One more thing worth accepting: some people won't get over it, at least not while they're still reporting to you. That's not your failure to manage — it's them working through something that has nothing to do with how well you lead. Your job isn't to make the situation feel okay to them. Your job is to be clear, consistent, and fair, and to address it when the professional line gets crossed.
The managers who handle this well aren't the ones who are most empathetic. They're the ones who have the direct conversation early, hold the standard steadily, and don't make the resentment their problem to solve.
