What Breaks the Camel's Back: Part 3
Pressure to be Perfect
THE SITUATION
I’m a manager running a well-oiled machine of a team. I sign off on all work before it’s shipped, give advice and direction, and make adjustments based on what I think the team needs. I spend a lot of hours fighting fires, and planning and reviewing work to make sure the team is set up for success—that’s just life as a manager. My team needs a strong and firm leader who can confidently lead them through anything. And they know that if they need me, my door is always open.
THE PROBLEMS
FIREFIGHTING
Firefighting—jumping from one urgent business need to the next—is common for many teams and managers. While firefighting may seem exhilarating in the moment, it isn’t healthy. When you’re firefighting, there’s only room to look at what’s right in front of you, leaving no time for recharging, reflection, or your team. On top of that, firefighting usually means your priorities are constantly shifting.
Firefighting can also result in you being out of touch with your team. If your calendar is packed and you’re never available, how can you know what’s happening on your team? How can you build and maintain their trust if you’re never there when they need you?
MY DOOR IS ALWAYS OPEN
Have you ever had a manager who told you that if you needed anything, their door was always open? Did you use that door?
I once had a manager who used that phrase and said I should send them an instant message if I needed anything. I knew their calendar was jam packed, so I felt like I would be bugging them if I decided to reach out for help. When I did reach out for help, I wouldn’t get a response for hours, and then I needed to wait until all their meetings were over before I could get what I needed. Eventually I stopped reaching out for help because I didn’t think I would get it. Saying your door is always open might not be as inviting as you think it might be.
MICROMANAGEMENT
When well-intentioned managers are hanging out in the weeds of their team’s projects, trying to help out with everything and insisting on reviewing all work before it ships, it can send the message that they don’t trust the team to do work themselves. It can also add confusion around who is ultimately responsible for work. This is an especially common occurrence for new managers who were recently promoted from individual contributor roles where they were known for getting things done.
SUPERHEROICS
Being strong, confident, and working all the hours might seem like what your team needs from their manager, but it’s not. When you work 12 hours every day, respond to emails at 11pm, and work while you’re on vacation. what message does that send? I would wager that your employees will feel pressured to do the same.
A GROWTH MINDSET
Many managers feel like they need to have all the answers and be the perfect leader. They don’t ask for feedback and they assume they know what their teams need. The problem here is that nobody can read minds. You might think things are going great on your team, but how can you know if you don’t ask? If you aren’t providing a regular forum or mechanism for your team to provide feedback and input for improvement, how can your team embody a growth mindset. Getting feedback is scary, but what you risk by never asking is scarier.
THE SOLUTIONS
A while back I was facilitating a workshop for front line managers on building team culture. One manager happened to have his team leader with him. I had the managers conduct retrospectives, reflecting on how their teams had been collaborating together–meetings, making decisions, prioritizing, etc.—and what was and wasn’t working. After the activity, we shared reflections as a group. The manager who had his team leader with him shared an important observation.
He said “I was shocked when my team leader and I conducted our retrospective. There were a few things that were similar and that we agreed on but there was a lot that I had no idea wasn’t working. It was eye opening to hear his perspective and realize that there’s so much room for improvement and innovation. Without the retrospective, I’d have never known.”
As a manager, the pressure to be perfect can be suffocating, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Below you will find a few experiments you can try out with your teams that will lead to less firefighting and micromanaging, better prioritization, and more connection, reflection, innovation, and growth.
Experiments to Try:
1) Set up recurring and regular team retrospectives. The retrospective is an exercise that involves reflecting on finished projects or work periods with the goal of identifying what worked, what didn’t work, and opportunities for improvement.
Within a team, retrospectives:
Provide a regular, and predictable forum for providing feedback
Normalize discussing sensitive topics and creating an atmosphere of continuous growth rather than blame
Build a sense of ownership and co-creation
Build trust and psychological safety
This exercise can be done in an hour or less every month or two. With practice, your retrospectives will become more and more fruitful.
If you’d like a free pdf resource that breaks down the what, why, and how of executing a retrospective, send a note to rory@thewayswework.com
2) Get laser focused with a prioritization process that you use with your team. That way, when you have another hot priority coming down the pipeline, you can hold it up next to your existing priorities and ask:
Is this more important than our existing priorities?
If so, why?
If so, then what existing priority are we going to put down until the new one is complete?
Including your team in this process will build trust and a sense of co-creation and shared ownership.
Happy experimenting, and as always, The Ways We Work is here to help.
