Missing Conversations

In this episode, we talk about missing conversations - the ones you know you should have, but don't. We've all avoided conversations or tip-toed around them, never really saying what we want to say, to avoid discomfort or for fear of damaging a relationship. Or have you sent emails to your whole team when you really wanted to send a message to just one person? These avoided conversations can cause far more harm than not having them at all. We dive into how NOT having a conversation damaged the Trust between a leader and her direct report, caused a ripple effect within their entire team, and resulted in frustration, overwhelm and resentment for everyone. You’ll come away with insight on how to avoid ending up in the same mess and tools to have that conversation you're not having.

We want to thank the team that continues to support us in producing, editing and sharing our work. Jonah Smith for the heartfelt intro music you hear at the beginning of each podcast. We LOVE it. Hillary Rideout for writing descriptions, designing covers and helping us share our work on social media. Chad Penner for his superpower editing work to take our recordings from bumpy and glitchy to smooth and easy to listen to episodes for you to enjoy. From our hearts, we are so thankful for this team and the support they provide us.

Transcript

Ila: Hi, My name is Ila Edgar. 

Charles: And I'm Charles Feltman. And this is trust on purpose. 

 We created this podcast with the intention of offering you new skills, behaviours, and actions that will help you build stronger trust in your lives. We explore issues that arise in the workplace and offer guidance for leaders, coaches, human resources practitioners, and contributors, to help understand what's underneath these issues. The issues we often find are related to trust. 

Ila: In this particular episode, we're going to talk about something that both of us hear often from our clients. How a missing conversation can quickly lead to distrust. whether between a leader and a direct report or the other direction, it can complicate getting good work done.

Charles: We're going to start with a story you might be able to relate to because you may have experienced something similar in your work life. Marge is a leader of a team of five. She's a hands-on leader, engaged in the day-to-day work of her team to help keep them on track to remove barriers and provide mentoring and coaching where she thinks it's needed.

 She's feeling overwhelmed though, at the moment, as she has had to take on additional work, usually handled by one of her direct reports, Pat. Pat's worked for Marge for a few years. Overall, there haven't been any major issues with Pat. Work's been completed on time. In fact, Marge likes Pat and has enjoyed working with him.

His knowledge and experience are at a level that supports the work. But in the last couple of months, Pat has been missing deadlines. This not surprisingly has impacted the whole team and especially Marge who reports to the senior leadership team on deliverables. As a result of these continued missed deadlines, she's begun to send reminders to the whole team regarding the deadlines, but really the reminders have been directed at Pat in her mind.

And this hasn't worked well. Nothing's changed, still missing deadlines. Now she's actually doing his work, making sure that it's complete by the deadline. So she doesn't have to take the brunt of criticism at the senior leadership meetings. She's frustrated, she's agitated. She feels resentful for having to do this work on top of her already heavy workload.

 She says she really can't trust Pat at this point. So, what do you hear in this story, Ila?

Ila: There are a few things. And, actually, a new one has emerged as I listened to that situation, that Marge is also managing trust between her and the senior leadership team.

Right? And so there's another added dynamic there. 

Charles: What do you see as the places in which trust might be becoming an issue for her? When she says, you know, I really can't trust Pat anymore. What do you see as the places where she can't trust him? 

Ila: Well, she's not trusting him to meet his deliverables. That could be because she's not trusting his competence anymore. That could be because she doesn't trust his reliability anymore. So there are a number of different factors that might be at play. 

Charles: Yeah. And, I suspect like many of our clients, and I know you've come across this before as well. She just has an on-off switch for trust. Either trust or don't trust. So when she says she really can't trust Pat anymore, what she's saying is, and I'm sure it's a difficult thing for her to say, but she's saying I can't trust him at all anymore. Either I can trust him in getting the deliverables in, or I really can't trust him. A big issue for her in this whole thing maybe that she's having to write Pat off. 

Ila: That feels so heavy and hard. And especially if you know, she's feeling overloaded, tired, resentful, trapped, and it can be very easy to feel like the only option you have from that place is to jump to something that's difficult and has a finality to it.

Charles: And, put on top of that, that she's worked with Pat for a long time and she's actually enjoyed working with him. She likes him. I 

I suspect that this makes it even more difficult for her to think about doing something. And at the same time, she's kind of at the end of her rope, she doesn't really know what to do. 

Ila: Mhm. 

Charles: What are the impacts? We've talked about the impacts from Marge that she's overworked, she's overloaded, she's resentful, she's angry, and she's beginning to distrust Pat as a person altogether. But what other impacts would you see happening in a situation for Marge, her team, the large organization? 

Ila: Well, as I mentioned, there's a trust relationship between her and the senior executives. But also we look at the rest of the team that she manages and because of taking on the extra work from Pat in order to meet the deliverables, my sense is that she also then doesn't have as much time for her other direct reports and they may be wondering why she's not managing this differently. And so it could be a level of mistrust in her leadership from the other direct reports. 

Charles: Yes. And I bet if we had an opportunity to ask them, they would say that they, they would say that they're beginning to lose some trust in her as a leader because she's not dealing with Pat. And it's probably impacting the other people on the team more directly as well.

I mean, they're not getting as much of her time. They're not getting as much of her leadership because she's working so hard to do some of Pat's work too. So as they lose trust in her as a leader that has a very difficult impact on the whole team. What conversations do you see that Pat could actually have and with whom? 

Ila: I think that's a great place. And I think there's a number of options here but the first and foremost is actually with Pat. And when we come from a place of care as a leader and we see behaviour that doesn't line up with what our experience and our previous data or reliability shows us, then we can go into a conversation to say, Hey, here's something that I notice. I'm worried about you. What's going on? And that is a big conversation that is missing. And if we rewind a little bit and talk about, you know, from feeling overloaded, angry, resentful, tired, it's really easy to go to. Well, I either keep sucking this up and doing it, and that's just the way it is, or I'm potentially putting Pat on a performance management or an improvement plan. But there's this beautiful spot in the middle that can create a whole lot of clarity and start to understand what's actually going on in the situation.

Charles: Yeah. So having that, just that simple conversation with Pat about what's going on, and one might wonder why she hasn't thought of this by herself already. And yet I know many really good leaders who just somehow miss that step, it goes right by them that they could do that. It's a possibility. 

So part of it is that, and by now we've got as you noted emotions, like resentment, anger, frustration, which don't really lead to thinking about a good conversation. In fact, if she does elect to have a conversation with Pat and she has that conversation from a mood of resentment or a mood of anger or frustration, it's not going to go that well. It's not just about the conversation itself. It's about how she has that conversation, the context for it. She's going to have to be able to pull herself back in and really shift her emotion, her mood, to make the conversation useful for Marge and Pat.

Ila: The other perspective we can look at here from a missing conversation is there's a reason why Pat and his behaviours have changed, whether it's a big blip or a small blip, but something's happened. And at what point could he potentially have also approached her to say, can we have a conversation? I'm struggling.

I need to talk to you about something that's really important. 

Charles: Yeah. That's absolutely an option for Pat. If his boss is not stepping up and having the conversation with him, he needs to go have that same conversation. Or initiate that conversation with her. In fact, I was just talking to someone the other day, who was in this very situation and needed to have a conversation with her boss.

And of course, it's kind of nerve-wracking sometimes even, even though you've been with this person for years, and really feel like you know them to make yourself vulnerable and go and say, I've got a problem. And I need some forbearance here. I need some help And, in this case, the person I was talking to his client had had some new aspects added to her job, her role, and were struggling with that. And she was uncomfortable. Going and saying, Hey, I need some help with this new stuff that you've been asking me to do because she wanted to appear competent, wanted to not be a drag on the team, right. So this may be something that's going on with Pat. We don't know from the story that we've gotten from Marge's side, but one might want to take that into consideration as well. 

Ila: So as we think about, you know, again, Marge being in the position that she's in, feeling trapped and tired and overloaded, Pat could also be coming from a place of, This shouldn't be this way. I've been a good performer before I've always met my deliverables. I feel embarrassed or shameful that now this has changed, possibly humiliation about how the team and how she perceives him and his abilities. And so again, that might even not be on his radar as a possibility to say, Hey, I need some help or can we have a conversation?

Charles: One of the things I'm seeing in this story and from both Marge's perspective and Pat's is this notion of being vulnerable. For Marge, the vulnerability is actually having to have a direct conversation with Pat, someone who's been working well for it, suddenly is not performing at the level that she's used to from him, which many leaders, this is not an issue at all. Like, okay, well, I can figure that out, but there are also many like Marge who, it just feels uncomfortable. There's a vulnerability in doing that and a trust in themselves and a trust in Pat that he'll accept that conversation, or accept those questions and work with her. If you look at it from Pat's perspective, obviously there's a vulnerability for him.

So trust being in essence, making oneself vulnerable. That's an important piece here that often gets missed and not honoured in the workplace. 

Ila: There's another level that's kind of just coming into my thought pattern right now about many leaders that I've worked with say, my team is awesome. Right? Everything is great. And they've never had the experience of something like this happening. And so there's a newness or a beginner. I've never had to have a conversation about performance because I've always had a really high-performing team. And so I don't even know how to have the conversation let alone I've never done it before. 

Charles: And layer on top of that, the, oh my gosh, my team has been performing. Suddenly there's something broken. It's probably my fault. I'm probably messing up here somehow somewhere. and having to deal with the emotions of maybe embarrassment or some shame in that. So part of the job of the leader is to find a way to move beyond that, to take the bigger picture view and say, okay, I'm going to have to lead into this conversation. 

Ila: I feel like I want to plan to seed here for a future episode that we talk about just about the concept of overwhelm.

Charles: Ah, yeah. And what that does to trust what that does, to communication Cause that's certainly playing a role in almost every client in. I don't think I've talked to a client for a long time who hasn't said everything's perfect. I'm working right at the perfect level of my capacity. No, they're all saying, ah, I'm overwhelmed. I'm overworked. Oh my god. 

Ila: Yeah. 

Charles: What are the key conversations that may need to happen that would help rebuild trust between Marge and Pat and help get Pat back on track? 

Ila: Yes. I love it. For sure that missing conversation about this isn't normal. What's going on? Are you okay? But if we go back to our scenario and how we painted the picture that Marge had been sending out group emails to the entire team, although they were actually supposed to be directed at Pat. So make clear and complete requests, and I can hear Brene Brown's voice in the back of my head saying clear is kind, unclear is unkind. And we often feel that we are clear, but we're really not. 

Charles: And we often feel that we're direct when we're really not. And a direct request is made to the person who you are anticipating or would like to do what you're going to ask them to do. So writing an email to your team intended really for one person is not direct at all.

 So there's that kindness there and honour of that person and who they are and respecting them and their ability to deal with the situation. 

Ila: I did a test drive of this exact situation with a client last week. And I said, pretend that I'm new on your team and you're giving me instructions about this particular piece of work.

 She said her instructions and they were lovely. They were delivered kindly. And at the end, I said, I have no idea what you want me to do. I have no idea what you want me to do because she had offered so many options and you could use this or you could use this, or you could do it this way. You know, I really want to give you flexibility. But in that flexibility, it became very muddy and unclear to the point that I honestly had no idea what she wanted me to do. 

Charles: Yes, I've definitely heard similar kinds of requests. So a clear and complete request then deals directly with what the requester wants or needs. And it includes what I want, the timeframe I want it in, and my conditions of satisfaction. What will satisfy me in terms of how that's delivered. So with those three things in place, the request becomes clear enough for the other person to be able to say, yeah, I can do exactly what you're asking. No, I really can't. Or more likely if it's the boss asking it's well, I can't do part of this because X, Y, Z, but I can do this part.

 Or if you could help me take something else off my plate, I could do this whole thing by the deadline that you wanted. In other words, it's a start of a negotiation and then it should lead to a yes, I can do that. 

Ila: Yes. The other piece that I think is really important when we start to make clear and complete requests and it ties to accountability but also feedback is, Pat, thank you for delivering. I asked for this, this and this, you did this, this and this. I want to thank you for that. Please continue to do that. Or Pat, I asked for this and this, you delivered only part of it. We need to close the gap. Can you have this done by Friday at noon? And feedback is always coming from a place of helping the other person be successful, building them up and course-correcting where there's a gap or a miss, and it comes from a place of care.

Charles: When the leader cares for the people who are working for her or him, this is kind of automatic. And at the same time, even someone who cares deeply can miss that directness, miss that specificity. Just being aware of that. 

So it sounds like the kind of the keys for at least at this point, the keys for Marge and for Pat, are missing conversation.

What's going on Pat? Another missing conversation perhaps is here's the request I have for you. Specifically request Pat and for Pat to be able to say, and it has to be that Pat can say no, if Pat can't say no, then we have a problem. 

Ila: Yep. 

Charles: Or if Pat can't come back with a counteroffer of some kind, then we have a problem.

It becomes really difficult. So clear and complete request. What's the conversation before that it's the conversation of what's going on and really allowing Pat to express himself in this and listen. So there's the listening piece of that, what I call generous listening on Marge's part. The other side, of course, as you've mentioned is Pat and what could he do? He feels like there's something wrong here, and he probably is by this point, because Marge is probably acting pretty strangely around him. He could go forward and say, look, I need to understand something or notice that you're acting oddly or differently around me or I'm just struggling with something. Can we talk about this? 

Ila: Yeah. Each of those independently or tied together again, you know, you always say, a conversation about trust starts to build trust. So putting care and intention into a relationship because it matters to you, it goes a long, long, long way in building that additional foundation of trust.

Charles: Absolutely. Well, Ila, I think we can wrap this conversation for today. 

 I do want to just mention that, as we do these podcasts, we're using situations from our work as coaches where although they're real situations that we've encountered, we're changing them so that nobody could distinguish who we're talking about. But we do want to work with real situations. And we would also like to invite any of you who are listening to our podcasts to send us a situation if you would like to, that we can work with, and we can explore on a given podcast.

 So if you have a situation you think relates to trust in some way, please send an email to Charles@insightcoaching.com. That's I N S I G H T C O A C H I N G Dot Com. And we would love to hear from you. We'd love to have an opportunity to explore your situation for other people's benefit as well as your own.

So thank you, Ila,

Ila: It's been a delightful conversation. Thank you, Charles.