Time to Confront
One of my weekly prayers is:
There is a time to be nice and a time to confront. Please give me the wisdom to know the truth and the courage to do what is right.
As we wrap-up the first quarter this is an important consideration. There are areas of our lives and our leadership where we are procrastinating about positive change. This delay is negatively affecting our lives, the lives of others, and the profits that fuel our growth.
Where do we need to be nicer, and what areas of business need hard decisions?
SUGGESTION: If you struggle to be more appreciative and positive with others, or more systematically holding people accountable, then use the old "good cop - bad cop" negotiating approach to overcome your hesitation to act.
Start with "what is true" and make that the bad cop. We have to do what is true because that is the only path to doing what is right or best for the business.
For instance, you have an employee who could be performing better and you have not addressed it effectively.
What is true? The person's performance must improve.
How? Need to define clear, measurable performance objectives, behavioral expectations, possibly test for natural strengths and motivators (Talent Assessment), AND follow-up regularly for 90 days.
When? Now. Assess the daily cost. Multiply by your number of work days or hours. The cost is too high to continue your procrastination AND you are hurting the employee.
See the meeting ideas for an outline of additional ideas.
Here are some ideas to more fully explore the challenge of being nicer or confronting an issue.
- Nice
- How consistently do you recognize others?
- Do you know your employee's preferred rewards?
- What is each employee's definition of meaningful work?
- Do you believe your employees should be more thankful for what you do for them? (Then we should talk...) START HERE before working with others to be nicer.
- Confrontation
- Yourself: Your hiring system is weak or non-existent
- Yourself: You do not manage others consistently
- Yourself: START HERE... Confront yourself to make certain you are meeting or exceeding your standards. Then being nice or confronting others is much easier.
- Confrontation: Confronting someone can be empathetic and positive, or angry and aggressive. If you are too confrontational, or not enough, get some help to be systematic in confrontation. Learn to use the truth as the "bad cop" to help the other person engage in a solution more easily.
