How well aligned are you with:
· Your peers,
· Your direct reports, and
· Your boss?
I was checking in with a prior client, let’s call him Bob, this week and asked how he was doing. Bob reported a challenge in working with his boss, let’s call him Jeff, who tried to blame him for some strained relationships with some teammates.
To his credit, Bob’s been working to improve those relationships with two of his and making some progress, not as much as he’d like, but a definite improvement.
I asked Bob how he did this and he reported meeting two of them, one-to-one, and talking about their priorities, where they were similar, and where they differ from Bob’s.
Leader Alignment: Support your Peers
Jeff is a strong believer in holding his people accountable to achieve the metrics that have been set for each of them. That’s all well and good. The challenge is that he holds each of them accountable solely for their individual performance. Jeff has not held them collectively accountable.
I asked Bob if he had talked with his teammates about their individual metric goals. He thought for a moment and realized that he had not. He really doesn’t know specifically what his teammates are working to accomplish.
These metrics are important, not only to the performance of the health system but also because they directly impact each team member’s individual incentive bonus.
Bob realized that he did not know if the work that he was doing to improve performance on his individual goals had any effect on his fellow team members’ ability to succeed and realize their own goals (and therefore their bonuses).
At a higher leadership level, this disconnect of leader alignment is on Jeff, who as the team leader, had not brought the team together to ensure everyone knew each other’s goals and was committed to mutual success.
As frustrating as this is, it’s not all that uncommon. In this hectic world where leaders are often reacting to the latest crisis, it’s easy for something that is important, but not urgent, to fall off our plate and remain under the radar (to mix a few metaphors.)
So what is Bob to do? He could get frustrated about not having the most effective team leader, and use that as an excuse for poor performance and strained relationships with his team members. He likely will be careful to not upset Jeff, his boss, by pointing out this gap in leadership. He’s been burned before by this less-than-supportive boss.
Take control of Peer relationships
One thing he can do, and now will do, is schedule meetings with his teammates to discuss their individual performance goals, with a commitment to helping his teammates succeed.
It seems simple. It seems like this should have already happened.
But it hasn’t, and that’s not uncommon with highly stressed executives.
However, now armed with this insight, and committed to making relationships better with his teammates, I know that Bob will start changing the culture of this leadership team.
He’ll do it one relationship at a time.
He’ll do it by managing up, filling a void in the way the team is led.
But he will do it, and he will be a better leader for having done so.
If you'd like to learn more about leadership approaches to drive staff engagement, resolve workforce challenges, and decrease burnout, you aren't alone.
My partner, Bruce Cummings, MPH, LFACHE, and I formed Organizational Wellbeing Solutions specifically to help leaders develop resilient organizations in which the business, and the people, thrive. I’d truly appreciate your thoughts on this issue.
Feel free to leave a comment. Or click on the book appointment button and schedule a time to talk.
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