It’s often said that we leave our managers rather than our jobs, so it stands to reason that our boss has a significant impact on our career. It perhaps also stands to reason, therefore, that our boss changing is also going to be influential. That’s the finding of research from Wharton, which shows how a change in our direct manager can have a sizeable impact on our career.

Indeed, the research suggests that our managers can exert an influence on our careers even after they leave for pastures new. What’s more, they argue that this influence can be so profound that it can trigger movement by the employee within the firm itself.

“We spend a lot of time thinking about how employees build their careers, but employees have managers and those managers have careers of their own,” the researchers explain.

“Often individual employees are affected by the moves that their managers make. Employees should be aware that those moves by their managers are going to have consequences for their own careers, and they need to proactively think ahead.”

The study found that when our manager leaves, our annual bonuses can fall by around 4%, while longer-term incentives, such as stock options, dropped by an enormous 17%.