There’s an old expression about being “the cobbler’s children who have no shoes” that speaks to the very real tendency we can have as service providers to do better for others than we do for ourselves.
For those of you under say, 100 years old, a cobbler is a shoemaker…so that expression makes sense. This circumstance of doing better for others increasingly includes the similar malady among leaders who see deficiencies in rank and file of their organizations while not recognizing disconnection or distrust among their leadership teams. In fact, the distraction or disengagement of their people more often than not stems directly from the dysfunction at the leadership level.
While many of our clients come to us with the stated intention of having us help them develop programs and process to better engage their people to drive growth and customer loyalty, what we find is the need to first and foremost address issues among the leaders themselves. The likelihood of our ability to help them realize the results they desire is not all that good If they’re not willing to look in the mirror and take on the challenge of making a sweet pair of shoes for themselves before doing anything else. That’s a major reason that we take on only about half of the opportunities we could, because we’re in it to help you win it…not for the check.
Sometimes, it’s simply a matter of timing – an organization may not be ready yet for the reflection and renewal needed to be successful in achieving sustainable change. In other cases, the buyer prefers to continue to search for the painless pill that will magically cure them without any real investment. I’m an optimistic pragmatist, so I’ve gone ahead and outlined some useful information for you whether you’re in the category of the aware and committed, the unaware but willing, or the aware/unaware and not willing.
I have a long-time friend and colleague who likes to say that it’s hard to tell your client that her “baby is ugly” but sometimes you have to. The issue here really is telling your client that he’s ugly. Here’s the funny thing: when you’re talking with a leader who is genuinely committed to doing better and helping her organization do better, the conversation usually is easier than you might imagine. Being clear that you’re sharing your perspective to help the person and the business succeed as they have told you they want to succeed buys you a lot of forbearance. A little tact doesn’t hurt either.
So, really, for the leaders who know something is amiss at the leadership level and for those not as aware but open to the possibility, making these connections works and works well. It makes sense to them that, unless they get on the same page, they’ll never be able to consistently rally the troops. The fixes for them are relatively straightforward, though a lot of practice is required.
The biggest challenge lies with the leader who’s aware but in denial or actually unaware that one or more of her leadership team members is rowing the other way or trying to take the oars away from everyone else. One option for those of us on the consulting and coaching side of this relationship is simply to walk away. And, as noted above, we often do. But before we do – being passionate about helping clients grow and have a remarkable impact on their employees, clients, and communities – we fight like crazy to draw attention to this dysfunction and encourage its address. Often, the symptoms of this dysfunction include meetings that go off track regularly when the person in question hijacks the meeting to vet his own agenda.
This may be the insistence of visiting or revisiting tangential or previously resolved issues, the thwarting of others’ involvement in or contribution to the meeting, or other disrespectful behavior that can include getting up and walking out of a meeting. Another symptom is an ongoing appeasement of the most disruptive person owing to my father’s insistence that the “squeaky wheel always gets the grease” (also, see James Taylor’s “Shower the People”). When this situation becomes even more dire, people move from limiting their discretionary efforts (like choosing not to respond to calls for assistance, etc.) to actually voting with their feet and leaving outright. To me, the most toxic symptom is how much people begin to dread coming into work.
They feel that they “have” to go to work versus they “get” to go. All of this can be as the result of the behavior and influence of one senior person who operates against the best interests of the organization seemingly with the endorsement of its leader(s). There are very few circumstances (and I’m being incredibly generous here) in which one person is so important that their value supersedes all of the damage they inflict. How do you know if and to what degree your organization is suffering from distrust, disengagement, and/or distraction? If you are, why does it matter? If it does matter, what should you do?
• How do you know?—I’ve been told I sometimes speak over the heads of my audience. I’m not sure that’s true, but I’ve got this one for sure. How do you know? You ask. You ask frequently, you ask effectively, and you listen to what you’re told. Engagement surveys done annually are a good start. They need to be constructed by professionals who know how to get at issues and their dimensions. Survey instruments are increasingly adept at collating the comments they collect, and organizations that specialize in this work can powerfully report back about where your opportunities and challenges are greatest. You can do pulse surveys as well, targeting specific issues at particular times. You should be meeting regularly with your teams and then with each other as leaders to share what you’re hearing and talk about how to apply what you’re learning. Trust your gut. If you’re connecting with your people often enough to earn their trust and you’re observing your leaders and forming questions if not opinions, use your relationships to test what you think you’re seeing. I had a senior leader many years ago come to me – a few levels down – because I worked closely with one of his reports about whom he’s observed and heard a number of troubling things over time. We talked about this local leader, his strengths, some of his opportunities for development, and then came the zinger. I was asked – when I thought of what we could accomplish and how – could we have a more effective local leader…and should we? Bam. I’ve never forgotten that. I hesitated; he encouraged. Finally, I answered honestly. Soon, we have a better leader, and everyone benefitted from the change that only happened because the senior leader, looked, listened, asked, and acted.
• Why does it matter?—Sometimes, I find myself having a conversation with a prospective client that they asked to have; and I’m asked why they should take the course of action we’ve been discussing. Not, “why do clients choose to work with you?” but “why would we do this at all?” My response usually is along the lines of “you tell me…we’re having this conversation because ______?” I’m happy to share back what they’ve told me to this point, but the answer to their question already has been answered to some extent because we’re having the conversation. How or why addressing the situation matters to your organization is a function of the impact of the symptoms you’re experiencing and the greater recognition of the larger impact they’re having or will have if those symptoms are left untreated/unchecked. If you’re expect to grow this year by 10% and growth depends on your ability to generate new and innovative ideas, but only the leader of a business unit ever offers any ideas and most of those are about trimming existing budgets…and you grow only 8%, if you’re $100 million company, that 2% shortfall just cost you $2 million. If you’re publicly traded and the Street decides that your $250 million market cap should drop 10% because your growth is slowing, you just lost another $25 million. Setting added value aside, is the person causing the bulk of these issues worth $27 million? If so, don’t do anything.
• What should you do?—Learn, plan, act, succeed. If addressing the symptoms does matter – if you want to avoid loss and create additional value – and, oh by the way, have a company where people “get” to go work – then investing a modest amount of time in getting a crystal clear picture about what’s going on is the best place to begin becoming an even better business. The expert interpretation and guidance drawn from that picture should inform a planning process that allows you to act on the right things in the right way in the right order, with those actions enabling success. This is an ongoing, iterative process – it takes time and effort; but the results can be amazing. We had a client tell us just the other day, “thank you for the work that you do and for being so good at it.” Wow! The thing is, he and his team are doing most of the work. The greater success that they’re beginning to experience stems from his willingness and ability to look honestly at himself, to work hard to evolve into a different role, to make room for another senior leader to take on responsibilities, and to guide but not suffocate his team. At least as important to this leader as the performance of his company financially is the visible enthusiasm that his team displays every day and the way they are living to their values…including pointing out to him if he isn’t abiding by his commitment to do so. Pretty powerful stuff.
Nobody wants to be called ugly. But the ugly duckling only realized and benefited from his maturation into a swan when he chose to leave his cave and rejoin the world around him. If we’re honest with ourselves, gather information, and commit to working to be better at what we do – for ourselves, our team, our clients, and our communities – we can achieve great things. As a leader, you’re obliged to take on and remove obstacles that stand in the way of your success. If there’s someone, anyone standing in the way of that success, we need to be willing to invite that person to join in our effort to be even better, to get out of the way of it, or to leave us altogether.
If we don’t, that may be the only person left standing with us in the end, and that’s likely to be a very unhappy ending for you.
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