Category Archives: Accountability

Disconnection

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“In evaluating the health of any team, I need to look for states of connection and disconnection?” I asked.

Pablo nodded. “When you see a team in disarray, you will find disconnection. The team doesn’t go there intentionally, it goes there without thinking. Facing any dilemma, the team wants to remove the discomfort. The four typical responses of any team under stress is to fight, flight, freeze or appease. When they do, the group panics and fractures.”

“And the leader?” I asked.

“The inexperienced leader follows. In a meeting, you have seen it. A project is behind schedule because someone dropped the ball. Everyone knows who dropped the ball, but no one wants to call it out. People get defensive, engage in blaming behavior or avoid the subject altogether. There is silence, eyes look down. Then someone looks at the leader, who becomes the target for all eyes around the table. The body language clearly communicates that it is the leader who must save the team.”

“You said inexperienced, how so?” I prompted.

“The leader is being seduced,” Pablo replied. “The seduction is subtle, for the team is looking to be saved by the leader, but needs the leader to be complicit in the saving. And, the leader cannot resist the opportunity to be the savior. It is the hero incarnate. I know it sounds religious, but the mythology is there to illustrate the principle.”

“So, how does the leader prevent the seduction?” I looked sideways at Pablo.

“The team is attempting to put the issue squarely on the shoulders of the leader. The leader must resist and put the issue back on the team.”

“But you already described that the team is in panic, a state of fracture and disconnection?” I said.

“The leader must simply outlast the panic. The issue that has the potential to blow the group apart, has the same potential to weld the group together. It’s all about connection and disconnection.”

Working Relationships

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“If people do their best work in a place where they feel safe, what is it that managers can do to create that space?” I asked.

“We always want to do,” Pablo started. “If managers would only do this, do that, things would be better. It is not so much a matter of what managers do, it is a matter of the relationship between the manager and the team member. Do we have relationships built on dominance, pressure and compliance, or relationships built on cooperation, support and commitment? Organizational structure is the way we define the working relationships between people.”

“This sounds like culture,” I replied.

“Organizational structure defines the working relationships between people. Organizational structure is culture.”
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With inspiration from Lee Thayer, Leadership: Thinking, Being, Doing

Give Them a Problem to Solve

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“It’s all about connection,” Pablo said. “If a team member is connected closely with their manager, most likely they will remain engaged. If the team member becomes disconnected from their manager, or connected to a toxic manager, the job search has already begun.”

“Only the manager?” I asked.

“The manager relationship is the key, with a supporting cast of the team,” Pablo explained. “Conceptually, a manager’s accountability is simple (not easy). Create connection, prevent disconnection.”

“That’s the popularity of team exercises,” I said.

“The problem with exercises is just that. Exercises are exercises. They startup muscle memory, but if you really want to build a team, give them a real problem to solve. Stand back. Allow the team to struggle. In that struggle, you will see some things occur. Leadership will emerge, automatically. Leadership takes the form of restating the problem, clarifying the obstacles and laying down the challenge. If the problem is complex, it will require expertise in specific areas, team members will consult, rely on each other to help carry the burden. In essence, problem solving builds connection.”

Separated From the Group

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“And, what happens when that social network of people is interrupted, where the person becomes separated?” Pablo asked. “And that separation could be physical separation, or mental separation.”

“Do you mean, like sending a technician out in the field, alone, as a team of one?” I floated.

“Perhaps,” Pablo replied. “Or excluding someone from a meeting in which they had a vested interest. Remember, the lions, tigers and bears are not so physical anymore. There are a hundred things leaders can do to disconnect team members from the group. Sometimes, as leaders, we create that disconnection without thinking. And when we create disconnection, it shifts the mental state of the individual into distress. That mental state of disengagement, can be incredibly corrosive. I bet you already have someone in mind, who is in a state of disconnection, and whose behavior you see as counterproductive (at best).”

I nodded. “Stands out like a sore thumb.”

“But, let’s bring this down to work, because that’s what we are really talking about. It is not my purpose to teach you to be warm and fuzzy with your team. We are here to get work done. Let’s create a list of characteristics where the mental state is in work mode vs non-work mode.”

  • Work vs Non-work
  • Positive vs Negative
  • Productive vs Unproductive
  • Cooperative vs Collusive
  • Scientific vs Unscientific
  • Conscious vs Unconscious

“And what is more contagious that a positive attitude?” Pablo smiled.

I nodded again. “A negative attitude.”

Lost in Digital

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“But, there are no real lions, tigers and bears, at least not in the workplace,” I smiled. “So the issue of safety, physical safety, shouldn’t be an issue. My team members are safe, whether they work in the office, or they work from home.”

Pablo grinned. “The physical threats of days gone by are the psychological threats of today. We need to be together physically and we need to be together emotionally. The perceived threat of isolation is as powerful as the real threat. That is why the body language of communication is so important. A high percentage of what we communicate is non-verbal. What we can see in another person visually completes the content. What we communicate through words is mostly data. But, have you ever sent an email where the emotional content was completely overlooked, misconstrued or ignored? What we communicate non-verbally is trust, rejection, appreciation, agreement, disagreement, encouragement.”

“But in any teleconference, we can see the other person’s face, we can hear their tone of voice,” I observed. “It is truly almost like being there.”

“Almost, we assume,” Pablo replied. “Why is it, that even remote workers, when it comes to performance feedback, formal or informal, want the context of the feedback in person? What is it about the physical presence of two people, in proximity? We have meetings over teleconference, but have you ever asked someone to have lunch over teleconference. It works well for data, not so much for breaking bread. The emotional connection we all seek, in which we work the best, where we are most productive is often lost in a digital platform.”

Our Best Work

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“So, it’s not a control thing?” I asked.

“Wanting people back in the office sounds like a control directive,” Pablo replied. “I am sure some team members see it that way. But, your call to reassemble, physically in the workplace, is more of an invitation. It is an invitation to collaborate, to break bread, to share the workload and ideas.”

“You’re not going soft on me are you, Pablo?” I was curious.

“Not at all,” he replied. “When we are together, when we are safe, we can do our best work.”

Time to Step Up

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“I am ready to throw up my hands. I have come up with eight ways to Sunday for our route technicians to do a better job on their service calls. I am ready to do a Flutie drop kick and just let them deal with it.” Russell commiserated, hoping I would be sympathetic.

“Well, I think it’s a good idea,” I said.

“What do you mean?” replied Russell, still looking for sympathy.

“I mean, I think you should call your technicians together and let them deal with it. Look, the problem isn’t that your ideas are bad; the problem is they are your ideas. If you want your technicians to do a better job on service calls, the ideas have to come from them.

“One of the biggest mistakes young managers make is thinking that you have to solve all the problems of the world. You don’t. Spread the burden. You will be surprised at how your technicians will step up to the plate.”

Mailing It In

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“I’m stumped,” Susana announced. “I talk to my team, give them their assignments, so they know what to do, but then, it just seems they mail it in.”

“Meaning?” I asked. “Mail it in?”

“I can’t put my finger on it,” she said. “The team shows up for work. They show up on time. They do the work, but it doesn’t seem they care. I tried to talk to a couple of them about it, but they just shrugged it off.”

“I know what a shrug looks like, but what did they say?”

“They said the work was okay, that if they wanted something more out of their job, they would just go find it somewhere else. I was a little shocked. I mean, when I was growing up, jobs were scarce, and I felt lucky to just have a job. Finding another job wasn’t easy.”

“And, how did you feel about that job?” I wanted to know.

Susana stopped. “You know, I guess it was just okay.”

“Kind of like your current team?”

Susana nodded.

“So, what is different between your experience and your current team’s experience?” I asked.

“I used to think it was all about the unemployment rate. You know, supply and demand. Right now, there are lots of available jobs, so I guess it follows that mobility, free agency is pretty high.”

“And, what is the cost of that free agency, to you as a manager?”

“Turnover is a killer. I thought when we came out of COVID, when people’s government money ran out, there would be a glut of applicants looking for work. But the labor market is tight. Finding people, finding the right people, getting them trained up, letting them make a few mistakes is expensive.” Susana shrugged. “Then, if they are the wrong fit, I have to start all over again.”

“Is this just happening to you, or is it happening to other companies, too?”

“You can read about it in the press. It’s all over,” she replied.

“I know you pay competitive wages, so it’s not all about the money. Your work is no more, no less interesting than your competitor’s, so what is it, that would give your company, your team, a leg up in team member engagement?”

The Relationship

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So, I left Shannon to ponder why. Why was she drawn to be a manager? I asked you the same question.

Shannon was promoted to manager as the next thing in her career. It was different than she thought it would be. She thought being a manager would make her more important (it does). Being a manager provides authority to tell people what to do (prescribing authority).

The additional compensation doesn’t last. Being important may stroke a manager’s ego, but that ego trip wears thin very fast in the face of accountability. It’s not about the manager. It’s about the relationship between the manager and the team member. Shannon’s report –

“But you were right. It wasn’t for the money. It wasn’t so I could order people around. I just want to make a difference. A difference for the company, a difference for the people on my team and to make a difference for me.”

It seems that Shannon has a cause. But having a cause is not enough. To be a truly effective manager, Shannon has to be had by the cause. And it take some time to understand the cause, to be had by it.