Today, during practice one with a new, old client I pushed a few buttons on purpose. I called my new client a liar, because it was the truth. He didn’t like what he heard but he continued to listen. Magic. At the end of our practice, I asked him to write what he learned. He learned a lot. Here’s a sample of my notes from our first practice together. Read and extrapolate to you.
“You learned the politics of the corporate world involve holding down top performers. You said that you would not do this to your team. I told you I disagreed with you from reading your discovery. You lie to your poor performers on purpose. I asked you to write why you do this. Why do you think this is virtuous leadership. 12:09 you wrote. You don’t see a purpose in it, you began. You don’t see a point in telling poor performers the truth. You believe a warm body is better than nobody. (I’m going to convince you this is a lie)
Your experience has been that when you tell the mediocre ones the truth, they become intimidated and bullshit you. They tell you you’re too demanding, too intense, and you overwhelm them. They walk out and say your goals are unrealistic and too high. They don’t want goals. They don’t want to work. This is what you believe. You don’t deal with ’em cause you got too many fires already raging. You put them in the corner and try not to think about them. (This is another lie) When you don’t deal with a problem associate, the problem sits in you and festers. The problem and the person get worse. This is a leadership failure. You are the problem. The longer you wait, the weaker your leadership. You agreed even though it hurt to do so.
You contrasted this conversation to the one you have with high performers where “honest dialogue” is the default. Funny, you speak the truth where it’s easy and lie where it’s hard. You didn’t like this thought either. Next, we talked some specifics about your communication with the mediocre teammates. You said you quickly get to the point of “why even talk about it,” when you spoke of the poor ones. You’ve stopped believing in the poor performer well before they leave. “Why am I wasting my time,” you start to say to yourself. Yet you continue to do just that…
I hit you between the eyes with some real learning about your leadership style. I told you this is probably bleeding into your marriage. Yikes. You have the bad habit of giving up on people and not telling the truth. Yikes again. You are holding back on your poor performers. You are lying to them habitually. This is not a virtuous leader. The truth will set you free, but only if you embody it. You cannot pick and choose your spots. You agreed and wrote what you learned.”
Practice one was a good one. My client learned a ton. My client was challenged beyond his comfort zone. He got better, as a result, not bitter. He told me this is what he signed up for. I told him he’s kinda one sick puppy. We laughed and agreed on his PA. I have zero doubt he’ll get it done. He has zero doubt he’s being built. I guess you could say we’ve got a match. Funny, huh…
BUILT TO LEAD 