By Christine Comaford
Most leaders know that command and control is dead and that fear doesn’t motivate employees. Quite the opposite, in fact. That’s why, for the most part, we refrain from doing scary things. Only the worst bully bosses make it a practice to scream at an employee, or call him abusive names, or threaten to fire him the next time he makes the coffee too strong. Yet, even good leaders unintentionally strike fear in the hearts of their staff. More accurately, we strike it into their brains.
From time to time, we all say or do things that spark unconscious fears in our employees. The primitive ‘fight, flight, or freeze’ part of the brain takes control. When that happens, when people are stuck in the critter state; all they can focus on is their own survival. In other words, everything that makes them good employees—their ability to innovate, to collaborate, to logically think through problems—goes out the window. All decision-making is distilled down to one question: What course of action will keep me safest?
So how might we be inadvertently holding back our teams and crippling our own cultures? What, exactly, are we doing to send our people into their critter states? Here are some offenders.
You "help them out" by giving them solutions. Or you advocate when you should be inquiring. When we consistently tell people what to do instead of encouraging them to figure things out on their own, we develop a staff full of order-takers instead of innovators. On the other hand, when we engage staff in solving problems themselves, we create a sense of safety, belonging, and mattering, and of course, we help them develop a sense of ownership that will serve them—and the association—well.
Start inquiring and see what happens. Ask, “How would you do it? What impact might your course of action have?” After you do this a few times with someone, she’ll start expecting you to ask questions instead of give orders. She’ll start coming to you with ideas, seeking feedback and validation, and after a few of these sessions, she’ll come to you saying, "I have a plan, here it is, and speak now if you aren’t okay with it." Finally, she’ll stop coming to you altogether.
Your meetings are heavy on sharing and point-proving, light on promises and requests. Why might a meeting scare your staff? Because confusion and uncertainty create fear. On the other hand, short, sweet, high-energy meetings that have a clear agenda keep everyone in their smart state.
The key is to understand the five types of communication—information-sharing; haring of oneself; debating, decision-making, or point-proving; requests; and promises. The typical meeting is heavy on the first three and light on the last two. Ideally, you should focus on only enough information-sharing in order to solicit requests from parties who need something and promises from parties who will fill that need. Tune up your communication and the result will be meetings that are efficient and effective, and that keep your team happy and clipping along to glorious accountability and execution.
You give feedback to staff without first establishing rapport. Imagine for a moment that your staff are antelopes. Because you have authority over them, they quite naturally view you as a lion. It’s not that you’re purposely ruling with teeth and claws. It’s simply that they are peering out and coding who is a friend and who is a foe. That means unless you can get staff to see you as just another antelope” you won’t be able to influence them; they’ll be too busy ensuring their own survival to accept your feedback.
Here are three shortcut phrases that help people feel safe enough to shift out of their critter state:
- "What if…" When you use this preface to an idea/suggestion, you remove ego and reduce emotion. You’re curious—not forcing a position, but kind of scratching your head and pondering. This enables someone to brainstorm more easily with you.
- "I need your help." This is a dom-sub swap, because when the dominant person uses it, they are enrolling the subordinate person and asking them to rise up and swap roles. This is an especially effective phrase when you want a person to change their behavior or take on more responsibility.
- "Would it be helpful if…" When someone is stuck and spinning or unable to move forward, offering up a solution will help them see a possible course of action or positive outcome.
You focus on problems rather than outcomes. When you see everything as a problem, which causes anxiety, which leads to a reaction, which leads to another problem, it’s becomes a self-perpetuating cycle. The solution is to switch your focus from problems to outcomes. Instead of asking “What’s wrong?” and “Why is this happening?” you need to ask “What do we want?” and “How will we create it?”
You frame “change” the wrong way. Almost all leaders want—probably need—their associations to change. It’s the only way we can achieve growth. Yet as we all know, people inherently resist change. In fact, according to Rodger Bailey’s groundbreaking work on Meta Programs in the workplace, 2.65 percent of Americans can tolerate change only if it is couched in a specific context; that context is “sameness with exception.”
What does this mean? Essentially, it means leaders need to present the change as merely an improvement to what is already being done. Don’t use the C-word. Say "growth" instead.
Did you recognize yourself—in the list above? If so, you’re not alone. The good news is that once you can make the (relatively simple) changes, you are likely to see dramatic improvements in your results.
A former consultant to the White House, Christine Comaford is a global thought leader and specialist in human behavior and applied neuroscience. She is the author of several books, including Rules for Renegades and SmartTribes: How Teams Become Brilliant Together, to be released in June. She can be reached at www.christinecomaford.com.