Its difficult to be open and honest.
Accepting that you are wrong. Admitting you made a bad decision. Sharing that you are not accomplishing the task for which you took ownership. Not delivering on a commitment.
The difficulty isn’t less if you are among friends, extended family members, with a spouse, or a leadership team. See my post last week,- Leaders should behave like Trusted Advisors. In fact, maybe it gets more challenging. Especially if you are the leader, explicitly, or in your own mind.
Being open and honest starts with believing that you are in a trusting environment. It has to be true that admission of weakness (or the speaking of the truth when it is bad news) in any form doesn’t bring immediate negative consequences.
All members of a leadership team contribute to that environment.
In the weekly executive level 10 leadership meetings, the Integrator of a team running his or her company on EOS can help by providing a brief reinforcement of that goal just before beginning the reporting section of the Level 10 agenda.
Remind the team that its better for the individual Rock owner to say “off track” and “drop it down” early in the quarter when reporting on Rocks so that the whole team can IDS the issue and help get the Rock back “on track”. Remind everyone that you all are operating the company for the greater good, not departmental success or personal praise.
It will take awhile but the effort will be worth it. Just remember that you must say it seven times before someone hears it (and believes it) for the first time, especially if this is a change for your environment.
Photo credit: return the sun
