07Nov/18

Do You Trust Your Employees to Fail?

November 7, 2018BlogEmpathy, TrustVictoria

How Trust Works

Trust is powerful. It’s so powerful that we hold classes and workshops on how to build it. Coaches and consultants work with clients to help them understand how it empowers employees to perform beyond expectations. It gives people freedom to act without always seeking permission and above all else, it gives them tacit approval to continue doing the things that work and to get better every time they use it. So, what’s all this talk about the “dark” side?

Trusting to Fail is not the Same as Distrust

We build trust by building strong relationships. It doesn’t matter if the relationship is good or bad. It’s the up close and personal interactions that determine the strength not the quality. So, what happens in a bad relationship? What happens when a manager and employee don’t get along and the work starts to suffer? The stronger the toxicity, the worse the impact. There’s still trust, but it’s the trust that things cannot go right. No matter how much we want things to go well, we’re positive our employee will screw up. We are even willing to bet that things will go sideways. To clarify, this is not the same as distrust. It’s much worse. Distrust is the total lack of trust. Distrust is being wary of things going right and being surprised when they do. Trusting to fail is different because we expect things to go wrong and we feel a sense of satisfaction when they do. There’s a sense of” I told you so”. If we don’t believe an employee can be successful, we don’t have the capacity to support and encourage them. The employee is not motivated to change, and neither is the manager.

What it Looks Like

Jake has never been a strong performer and things are getting worse. He has received a couple of warnings and he no longer seems to care about doing a good job. Jake’s coworkers and clients are complaining, and you get frustrated every time you think about interacting with him. He takes a lot of your time to manage and termination seems inevitable.

Jake’s got a major project due at the end of the week and even though you have no indication, you’re already thinking “the project will be late and full of errors, so I’d better prepare to spend some time fixing it.” You haven’t seen the project, but you know it will be subpar because you are trusting that Jake will screw it up. At this point, you’re probably already writing the termination letter in your mind. And what about Jakes thoughts when he sees you. “My project is coming due, but I don’t even know why I try – they’ll only find fault with it. Maybe it’s time to start looking for a new job – I can’t win so why bother”.

Hiring Trustful Employees

OK, this may be an overly simplified example, but you get the point. People will work hard to meet our expectations and it doesn’t matter if we expect them to succeed or fail – they will perform accordingly. This is the real power of trust. As soon as someone is elevated to a position of authority, they have the power to impact others. It doesn’t matter if they want it or not, it comes with the title. The potential consequences of that impact can be positive or negative. Understanding and navigating the difference takes emotional intelligence, critical thinking and empathy for others. When hiring managers look for these core traits during the interview process, it helps ensure that new managers have the capability to not only build trust but to use it wisely. Trusting someone to do the right things can inspire greatness. Trusting them to do the wrong things can inspire mediocrity and ineffectiveness. In that case, it might be better not to trust them at all.

Are you trusting to fail? Check out our services here.

01Feb/18

Brainstorming Magic

February 1, 2018BlogBrainstorming, skills, Team buildingVictoria

Brainstorming Basics

Pick a topic
Set a time limit (3-5 minutes)
Throw out suggestions – no critiquing allowed
Decide which suggestions work best

Easy – right? WRONG! The key to successful brainstorming is getting people to suspend judgement but is easier said than done. Why? Because it is our nature to weigh and judge things, especially in a team setting. But you can do it, and when it works, it’s powerful.

The Exercise

For the past five semesters I have volunteered as a Leadership Coach for the Braven Career Accelerator at San Jose State University. One of the skills we teach them is effective brainstorming and during one class, I was coaching how it worked. The group was tasked with reinventing the resume and it was hard going at first. Not only did I have to discourage judgement, I had to spark creativity. It finally dawned on me that I had to get them to stop thinking of the resume as a piece of paper. I crossed out the word “resume” on the whiteboard and replaced it with “this incredible cool thing that you need to invent”. It was a mouthful, but I continued to use the phrase all evening.

Eventually, they caught on when one student came up with the idea of pop-up greeting card like the ones they make for birthdays. At that moment, something incredible happened. The floodgates opened, the atmosphere lightened, there was a lot of laughter and they were having fun. The ideas came pouring out fast and furious and I got to sit back and watch the magic. At one point, someone suggested a pillowcase. One student chimed in “so you can sleep on it” and the room erupted in laughter. When the semester ended, I met with my students one last time and they presented me with this.

Want to practice magic in your workplace? Check out our services here.

28Sep/17

Why is My Watch Telling Me to Breathe?

September 28, 2017BlogVictoria

Purple comment bubbles painted on sidewalk with instructions to breathe. Top one reads "inhale" and cuts into bottom one which reads "exhale".

kathleenport / Pixabay

Breathe, if we didn’t do it we would die but about every hour or so, my smartwatch sends me a reminder. I stop whatever I’m doing and concentrate on my breath for one full minute. While closing my eyes, I make sure my breath matches the pulses on my wrist that tells me to breath in (or is it breathe out? The correct sequence always escapes me). Somewhere in mid-breath, I start thinking “how weird is that? Am I’m so busy that I can’t consciously breathe without a reminder?”. Breathe. How did we get to the point that we need a device (even one as cool as a smart watch) to remind us to take a breath ?

We do it because we’re stressed. Think about it. We tell people to breathe to calm down. Women in labor focus on breathing to refocus from the pain. We even hold classes to teach them how to do it. We tell people to breathe when they’re angry, hurt or in pain. The idea is that breathing helps bring us into the present. I can recall times saying “Don’t forget to breathe” to someone as they faced the crisis of the week.

We concentrate on our breathing because it brings us into the present. It clears our minds of all the “coulda, shoulda, wouldas” that need our attention. It lets us concentrate on the “what is”. The here. The now. But it is only a beginning. Breathing alone does not bring us into the present. Breathing is not mindfulness, but it is the road that can lead us there.

Here’s the thing. My resting heart rate is 56 beats per minute (according to my smart watch). Do I need to remember to breathe? I don’t. Instead, I need to remember what’s important. It’s not about my breath, it’s about my priorities. What is important is what is happening right in front of me – every single minute of every single day. So, I intend to turn the tables. Starting today I’m turning off the smartwatch alert that tells me to breathe. Instead, I’m going to set a different alert. Now when it goes off it will say “be present”. I’m betting my breathing will take care of itself.

To start practicing mindfulness click here