“We know our bad habits, but we don’t know the cure” On commencing a coaching training programme, with delegates still fresh into the room and still with that air of ‘what’s this going to be about?, don’t they know how busy I am?, couldn’t this have waited for a few months?’ around them, I ask them to be open an honest about a habit they have as a manager that they are not proud of or that they dislike about themselves and that they would therefore like to cure. And out pours the honesty. I write them up on a flipchart and these then stay with us through the programme to keep us both focused and honest. I have started 3 programmes with 2 different companies encompassing 33 delegates in the last 4 weeks. Here, unedited, is a small selection of their ‘bad habits’: “I smother the guys in the belief that I can do it quicker and better” “I am impatient; I railroad through which is immensely frustrating for them” “I go from standstill to red hot in the blink of an eye” “I can be direct, verging on rude when people put up barriers” “When things kick off I defend my team; I don’t feel I deal with their shortcomings” “I expect my team to be mindreaders, then I get frustrated when it’s clear they’ve not grasped the situation” “I’m too laid back, and then end up being a whirlwind” “I’m impatient and may come across as arrogant” “I’m too laid back; I don’t delegate enough which makes it tough when deadlines change” “I am easily demoralised and I then probably spread this” “I don’t spend enough time supporting my staff and then see them struggle when things go wrong” “I hold onto old jobs that I like doing while the world is changing around me” You see how well people know themselves? The honesty is always stunning. However our defence mechanisms against having to change these habits are very powerful. First of all we believe that we need a huge amount of time to change. Secondly we fool ourselves into thinking that we will get that time when the world settles down a bit. In the meantime, our people get used to our ways and seem to forgive us for them, thus reducing the imperative for us to change. The biggest problem however is that we simply do not know how to change our behaviour when we are feeling pressured and frustrated and still get the job done. We are locked into a world of unchanging behaviours, and so we tell ourselves that all we can do is work harder and longer, and so the vicious downward spiral www.collaborativeequity.com continues. We get more frustrated and so do our people. We blame them and they blame us. And in that dynamic, no one is going to change........ The answer is to put managers through training that simulates the pressure they are under in real work situations, so that these habits come spilling out, and then to show them, in a real light bulb moment, that lying behind these manifestations of frustration, are the habits that are really to blame. And here are the real culprits: We ask closed questions (like machine gun fire!) We fill silences (anything over a few nanoseconds……) We answer our own questions (if we waited for them…….) We let people answer a different question (we can’t be rude…) We make statements (surely our words will inspire them……..) We ask several questions in one (it’s quicker……) We use ‘we’ instead of ‘you’ (we want to be inclusive……) We might almost call these the ‘Seven Habits of Highly Pressured Managers’. On the surface these might seem irrelevant, however these are the habits that actually get in our way, and that cause us to behave in ways that create the downward spiral. So, our bad habits are not the cause, they are the symptom, and the more we try and control them, the more frustrated we become. However, when shown the real underlying habits of our behaviour under pressure, things we were simply unaware we were doing, the light goes on. We become aware, and with awareness come true choice. Now we can put new habits in their place; things as simple as asking open questions one at a time, allowing people a few seconds to think and respond, asking a question again if the person does not answer first time around, not accepting that they ‘don’t know’ the answer, etc etc. Once managers learn to have fun with these new found tools, their world really starts to change in front of them, and they go back into their pressured world of work genuinely inspired to ‘have a go’. And how many training courses can you say that about? www.collaborativeequity.com
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