You Had Me At . . .

Tim sat in the staff meeting stone silent. The debate around the table was heated, tense, and at any moment, someone was going to get strangled. Tim was silent. Everyone had questions. No one had answers. No one. Except for Tim.

He knew why the system failed.

He knew why accounts were not being completed.

And, he had the answers, but Tim wasn’t talking.

When Tim was hired, he brought enthusiasm, ideas, and energy to every staff meeting. That slowly changed as his drive was met with negative feedback, dismissed ideas, or worse, his boss talking over him, cutting him off, and powering through with his self-righteous thoughts.

Tim. Sat. Silent.

We can get mad at Tim for not saying something, for not bailing the team out, but Tim has tried. Tim has learned his voice is not important. Tim should be seen and not heard.

Let’s go back and fix this. Great leaders engage their teams. They build a trust relationship where ideas can be shared, where both leaders and team members can be vulnerable to establish trust.

Consider this:

H – Honesty creates vulnerability, and vulnerability builds trust. Be honest with yourself and your team. If you don’t have an answer or know something, admit it. Tell the truth. Be honest with your team and expect honesty from them.

E – Empathize with your team. Empathy allows us to connect, again, building trust. Great leaders know their team members, and their team members know they can talk to their leaders.

L – Learn about your team. If I tell you, “I care about you,” but I don’t bother to learn anything about you, your family, or your interests, will you believe me? Learn the little things. Significant relationships are built on learning the little things.

L – Listen to everyone. If someone is willing to speak up during a staff meeting, listen. No one wants to look foolish. Don’t be dismissive or brush off their comment (see Empathize). Every team has a person who can dominate a room. If that person is on your team, then it’s your job as a leader to encourage others to participate. If you don’t, then your staff meetings will be one-sided, and great ideas won’t be shared.

O – Open your door. There will be times when an idea will have momentum in a meeting and “sound” great. But as great as the idea sounds, there could be a flaw that someone recognizes, and because of the momentum, they’re afraid to share. Great leaders have an open-door policy that allows private conversations to occur.

Let’s go back to Tim in the staff meeting.

• What if his leader had built a relationship of trust through empathy and honest conversations?
• What if Tim felt like he was a person and had a voice that would be heard and respected?
• What if Tim knew he could discuss potential flaws in the privacy of his supervisor’s office?

Would Tim be silent?

In life, our routines can slowly turn into ruts. It’s the same in business and leadership. “We’ve always done it this way” doesn’t mean it still the best way to do it.

In leadership, if you’re not working on it, it isn’t getting better. How is your company developing your leaders? If you “don’t have time” to really work on their development, then it won’t be long before the company’s leadership is outdated; and the results of that will be disengaged workers, your best employees leaving for a better work environment, and a culture that is apathetic at best. Even leaders need leaders.

DREAM4 wants to make you the hero of the story. We work with you to create an environment where leaders are working on themselves and investing in their team members. By partnering with us, we give you the time you need to work on the business while developing your team.

Reach out to us and let us help build the bridge between where you are and where you want to be.