mismanage
Americanverb (used with or without object)
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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mismanagesimple
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mismanagessimple
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have mismanagedperfect
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has mismanagedperfect
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am mismanagingprogressive
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are mismanagingprogressive
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is mismanagingprogressive
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have been mismanagingperfect progressive
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has been mismanagingperfect progressive
Past
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mismanagedsimple
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had mismanagedperfect
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was mismanagingprogressive
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were mismanagingprogressive
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had been mismanagingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of mismanage
Explanation
To mismanage is to handle something badly. A company will go bankrupt if its leaders mismanage it. If you mismanage your allowance, you’ll be out of money in no time. To manage is to handle or run something, so to mismanage is to make a mess of something you're doing or running. A general manager could mismanage a basketball team by trading away good players. The President can mismanage the country by making political and economic mistakes. You can mismanage your time if you goof off and don't get your work done. To mismanage is to mishandle.
Vocabulary lists containing mismanage
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Deirdre said the reason people are going to food banks is "not because we mismanage money. It's not because we can't budget. It's because there isn't enough to budget."
From BBC ● May 24, 2025
“We didn’t have any money to mismanage, because we didn’t have any money,” Spence said of the JFK8 campaign.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 14, 2022
I didn’t understand how people with enough money could so easily mismanage it or make monumentally bad financial decisions.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 30, 2022
As he approaches a likely third term in power that would start next year, it could be politically damaging if his government were to mismanage Evergrande.
From New York Times ● Sep. 26, 2021
It was natural, she supposed; he was clearly very sensitive on the subject of his own humble origin and bringing-up; but she sighed that a perverse youth should so mismanage his opportunities.
From Fenwick's Career by Ward, Humphry, Mrs.
Reporting from The New York Times has highlighted the way that the jail complex mismanages the stationing of its nearly 8,000 uniformed staff members, with some rarely interacting with detainees at all.
From New York Times ● May 9, 2022
Wired’s investigation is a deep dive that demonstrates how your data can be at risk if a massive company mismanages internal access to it or carelessly leaves it open to outsiders.
From The Verge ● Nov. 19, 2021
"It’s not uncommon that a conservator mismanages money and profits off of that," Kaplan said.
From Fox News ● Oct. 1, 2021
I am afraid she mismanages her affairs sadly.
From Wives and Daughters by Gaskell, Elizabeth Cleghorn
I have been very happy sometimes during the past year; and whatever the blind Fate that mismanages the world may elect to demand in payment, I shall not haggle.
From The Cords of Vanity A Comedy of Shirking by Cabell, James Branch
Reached by telephone, Marino declined to comment on the letter or the mismanaged director’s search.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 10, 2025
This is "insurance" in case of "state collapse or a prolonged crisis", said Bajolet, adding these funds had been "mismanaged by the DGSE".
From Barron's ● Nov. 6, 2025
Jones regressed and got benched—raising concerns that Belichick had mismanaged the young passer’s development.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 7, 2025
He was fastest in the first session and said he felt Ferrari had mismanaged the rest of qualifying.
From BBC ● Oct. 4, 2025
But that casino, mismanaged and too far away from major highways, was a money-losing business.
From "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" by Sherman Alexie
A celebrated government-run health system has been mismanaging medicine for years.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 6, 2026
The group were were being punished for "mismanaging" the battery exchanges for Spiro motorbikes, which they denied.
From Barron's ● Jun. 30, 2026
Local representatives for years have blasted the Fish and Wildlife Department for mismanaging black bears and demanded the agency mitigate what they describe as a public safety threat.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 1, 2025
And the trustees of a bankrupt trucking company accused insurer UnitedHealth Group of mismanaging millions of dollars.
From Seattle Times ● Aug. 6, 2023
For weeks before Garfield's death, medical journals and general newspapers had accused Bliss of mismanaging his care.
From "Ambushed!" by Gail Jarrow
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
