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How to Identify and Motivate Slackers on Your Team

January 25, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Leadership, Project Management, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

bored office worker

You put in a lot of time and energy into leading slackers, but you don’t get anything back in terms of results. Your job as a leader is to figure out what will motivate them to perform.

One type of detractor you might deal with is a slacker. These people are in the lower left corner of the leadership matrix. You put in a lot of time and energy into leading them but you don’t get anything back in terms of results. Slackers have the talent to get the work done. They just done care. They’re not motivated to do it. Leaders spend a disproportionate amount of time managing slackers. They require constant supervision and motivation. What’s so frustrating about them is they have the capability to do the work. They just choose not to.

Identifying Slackers

There are some easy ways to spot a slacker. They tend to be smart and have a strong resume. They can tend to be very self-promoting. They might be a frequent job changer. They’re difficult to get work out of because they constantly debate the merits of your request rather than doing the work. They might renegotiate their deadlines frequently. They’re more interested in other people’s work than their own work. They can tend to be outspoken. They annoy other team members because they always wander into that team member’s lane instead of focusing on their own responsibilities. Other team members push back a lot of times on covering for the slacker because they know the slacker has the capability to do the work.

I know one slacker very well. He was me. I had a role where I had previously been excited about the work I was doing. My boss changed my responsibilities. I was not thrilled with those new responsibilities so I started mailing it in. I just didn’t care. I became very frustrating to lead. I absolutely had the ability to do that work. I just wasn’t excited by it. My form of silent protest was to just not do the work and focus on everything else that was going on in the division. I drove my boss nuts. He was at my desk all the time pushing me, asking where the results were. I never had results to offer. If you spot a slacker on your team, get ready for what might be a long, drawn out engagement trying to motivate them and understand what’s going to get them to deliver the results you expect of them.

Motivating Slackers

Your slackers are in the lower left corner of the leadership matrix. You have to put in a lot of time and energy into managing them, and you don’t get anything back in terms of results. The issue with slackers is they’re unwilling to do their job. They drag the team down with their poor attitude. Slackers require motivation.

The leader’s job is to figure out what will motivate a slacker to perform. This can be in the form of incentives or punishments if need be. Slackers need to have expectations and consequences clearly laid out. The leader has to figure out what motivates the slacker. Whether it’s new responsibilities, compensation, or visibility, once a slacker’s motivated, their performance tends to improve quickly because they have the capability to do the work. The leader’s goal with a slacker is to unlock their motivation. Sometimes that includes moving them to a new role or even out of the organization to a job where they’re going to be happier. This requires the leader to invest more leadership capital in the near term figuring out how to motivate this individual.

For example, let’s say you have a slacker on your team. They have a big presentation that’s two weeks late. You sit down with them and you understand that they have the capability to do the presentation. They just don’t seem to be doing it. When you ask them what would excite them about working on that presentation, they tell you, “Well, you always present the presentation. I never get any visibility here for all the work I put in. That’s not a lot of fun.”

Now you have the key. You can unlock that slacker’s motivation. In this situation you might say, “Well, I’ll tell you what—if you finish the presentation, I don’t need to be the one who presents it. You can present it in front of the leadership team.” You might see their performance change dramatically to the positive in that moment. You’ve unlocked their motivation. You understand they want visibility. As soon as you connect the visibility with the work you’re asking them to do, you might see their entire attitude change.

The benefit of more effectively leading a slacker is that they could quickly become a higher performer. They’ve got the skills, just not the motivation. You’re also demonstrating to your team that you’re focused on results and that you will hold people accountable. If you do decide to move that slacker out of the organization because you can’t find proper motivation, make sure their attrition is as positive as possible. Help them transition to that new organization.

Your key as a leader when dealing with a slacker is figuring out with that motivation is. As soon as you know that motivation, you can get them to change their performance.

Want to learn more about developing your team? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to assess and improve your strategic plans. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!

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Sisters, Service, and Sales

January 23, 2023/0 Comments/in Books, Communications, Customer Service, Entrepreneur, Guest Blogger, Leadership, Sales, Training /by Trevor Jones

customer

Customer service that is focused on customer relationships will impact your ability to make sales and to improve your business.

Today’s post is by Kate Edwards, author of Hello! And Every Little Thing That Matters (CLICK HERE to get your copy).

There is a scene in the Tina Fey/Amy Pohler film “Sisters” that is hilarious. The scene takes place in the dressing room of a trendy shop where the eponymous sisters go shopping for dresses for a party they are hosting that night. They go to a boutique and try on a number of party dresses, but they are clearly clueless. Each dress the sisters put on is completely unflattering as they wear the dresses in all sorts of inappropriate ways.

The shop clerk watches them in deadpan horror and her face expresses what we are all thinking: each dress is worse than the next. The clerk, however, doesn’t help them put the dresses on correctly or offer them sizes that fit; rather, she says “that looks amaaaazing” in a completely flat tone. This character is the epitome of the lackluster clerk who clearly has been told to compliment the customers. No. Matter. What.

Service that is inauthentic, unhelpful or pushy is the stuff of horrible Yelp reviews and comedic movie scenes. But service doesn’t have to be like that. Businesses that take time to connect authentically to their customers will build a client for life. And businesses that ignore service in the sales moment are doing themselves great harm as sales are based on a human connection. Here are some easy ways to connect with your customers that will make the sisters of your business – service and sales – shine.

Establish Customer Quotas, Not Sales Quotas

Too many businesses focus on the number of sales rather than the number of customers. You must remember that customers make sales. Ask your salespeople to create relationships with every type of customer – not just the ones they already know.

Read more

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How to Focus Joyriders on Your Team

January 18, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Leadership, Project Management, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

 

Joyriders are team members that you don’t invest a lot of leadership capital in, but you also don’t get anything back from them in terms of results.

Your Joyriders occupy the lower right corner of the Leadership Matrix. You don’t put in a lot of time and energy but you also don’t get anything back in terms of results. Joyriders can be really tricky to identify. They have a lot of energy and enthusiasm. They seem to constantly be busy. Unfortunately, they seem to work on everything except their core responsibilities. Leaders tend not to spend a lot of leadership capital on joyriders because they seem like they’re delivering results. But at the end of the year they tend to come up short on what was expected of them.

Some ways you can spot a joyrider are they’re high energy, they’re enthusiastic, they’re busy, and they’re social at work. They have broad interests in a lot of different areas. They constantly come to you with new ideas. They’re the first person to suggest launching a new special project. They’re constantly volunteering for things outside of their area of responsibility. They also have a very light track record on results. They’re hard to pin down on their core deliverables and their deadlines. Their teammates end up covering for them and doing the work the joyrider was supposed to be doing. It’s easy to miss a joyrider. The key is to look for a lot of activity and not a lot of results.

How to Focus Joyriders

Leading joyriders involves investing additional time and energy into monitoring this person’s activities and focusing them on their core responsibilities. This means more frequent check-ins and putting more structure and measurement to their work. The additional leadership capital you spend on them is designed to improve their results. Once their behavior’s changed and they start delivering what’s expected of them, leaders can typically pull back and give them the room to operate.

Your goal is refocusing a joyrider on their core responsibilities. Inventory their workload. Reassign or stop unnecessary work that isn’t related to their core responsibilities. Closely manage them against their core duties. Add structure to their check-ins. Have them come in with a list of all the projects they’re working on. Have them articulate what the status is for every single project. And if they start talking about something that’s outside their responsibilities, put a stop to it immediately.

The benefit of more effectively leading a joyrider is that it’s going to surface a core performance problem. You’re going to see where there might be skill gaps or results gaps in what they’re delivering or not delivering. This is also going to demonstrate a results-focused leadership style to the rest of your team. Your team knows this person isn’t getting their work done, mostly because the other team members have to do the work for them. They’re probably not very happy about that. When they see you finally holding this joyrider accountable to doing their job, they’re going to feel a lot better about the work they’re doing. It’s also going to get that extra work off their plate and onto the joyrider’s plate where it belongs. You’re now going to be getting results from a previously non-producing part of the team.

The other benefit is there’s potentially a dramatic performance turnaround here. This person has a lot of energy. They have enthusiasm. Your job as the leader is to make sure you focus it on their most important responsibilities.

Want to learn more about developing your team? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to assess and improve your strategic plans. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!

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How to Develop the Square Pegs on Your Team

January 11, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Leadership, Project Management, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

Square pegs are team members that require a lot of your time and energy, but they’re not yet delivering the results you expect. One of the biggest benefits of leading a square peg well is you get to feel the satisfaction of helping somebody else grow and develop. 

Square pegs occupy the lower left corner of the Leadership Matrix because you’re putting in a lot of time and energy helping them build skills, but they’re not yet delivering the results you expect. Developing square pegs can be fun. It can be rewarding. These people want to perform well. Your job is to coach and develop them to help them build those required skills. Square pegs tend to take to such coaching and development eagerly. Their performance can improve quickly with the right intervention.

Some square pegs lack the skills that are going to make them effective. In those instances, sometimes moving a person to a new role can be your best option. Your goal with a square peg is to fill their skill gaps. Communicate your performance expectations of them and where they’re performing relative to those expectations. Let them know that the status quo is not sustainable. They need to improve their performance. Identify the skill gaps they need to fill. Build a plan with that individual for how they’re going to improve those gaps. It may be training. It may be new responsibilities. It may be coaching from someone else on the team. Set deadlines with them for you to see that performance improvement.

I have one individual who I work with as her executive coach. She had a member of her team who went from being an individual contributor to leading other people. This individual had never led anyone before. He became a square peg. She had to spend a lot of time with him teaching him how to lead other people, how to motivate the members of his team, how to set direction, and set priorities for the work his team was doing. He was in her office multiple times a week. She invested so much more time and energy into him than when he was an individual contributor. The good news was that he wanted to learn these skills. He was excited about leading other people. His performance improved pretty quickly.

The benefit of effectively leading a square peg is that you’re going to be reducing problems for other members of the team. The square peg isn’t getting it done and other people have to pick up the slack. By improving their performance, you’re making everybody else’s life easier. You’re going to take somebody who’s not performing and move them to being a performing member of a team. One of the biggest benefits of leading a square peg well is you get to feel the satisfaction of helping somebody else grow and develop. You’ll help them identify the gaps they need to fill and move them down that path to success.

Want to learn more about developing your team? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to assess and improve your strategic plans. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!

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Do You Have a Square Peg on Your Team?

January 4, 2023/1 Comment/in Business Toolkit, Leadership, Project Management, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

blocks

One type of detractor you might have on your team is a square peg. Square pegs have the willingness to do well, but they lack the skills to perform effectively.

One type of detractor you might deal with is a square peg. They’re going to be in the lower left corner of the leadership matrix. You’re investing a lot of time and energy into them, but not getting a lot back in terms of results.

Square pegs have the willingness to do well, but they lack the skills to perform effectively. Sometimes it’s due to being placed in a new role. Other times it’s a function of them not having the training or resources they need. You’ll spend a lot of leadership capital on a square peg because you need to help them develop and grow. You’ll also spend that time and energy on fixing work they’re not doing correctly. Leaders have to figure out the root of the performance gap and help that square peg build the skills they need to perform effectively.

You might have a square peg on your hands if they regularly need rework. They may ask for time extensions. And their work needs to be repaired a lot of times. They’re unable to perform core tasks up to your expectations. Sometimes they even repeat the same errors. Other people tend to work around them. These square pegs are often mentioned as a source of other people’s problems. Sometimes a square peg might be territorial. They may come across as insecure or highly stressed. Sometimes these people are very hard to help.

I had one square peg on one of my consulting teams. Coming into the consulting engagement, I knew he was lacking some skills. That was the good news. The bad news was I had to invest a lot of time and energy helping him build those skills. He did analysis; a lot of times, it was wrong. I’d have to sit down with him, work through the model, and show him how to build it correctly. His presentation pages didn’t look that great. I was not going to put his pages in front of the client. A lot of times, I redid the pages myself. It took a lot of time and energy on my part.

The good news is he was aware of his skill gaps coming into the engagement. He was also very motivated to fix those gaps. When I would sit down with him to go over his analysis or his pages, he was all ears. He was taking notes and trying to improve. It made it a lot easier to work with him. Over the course of the four months we worked together, I did see his skills improve dramatically.

If you have a square peg on your team, they’re going to be pretty easy to spot. Their work isn’t up to standard and you’re going to spend a lot of time helping them build skills and bring their work to a level of quality that’s acceptable to you.

Want to learn more about developing your team? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to assess and improve your strategic plans. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!

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How to Wean Squeaky Wheels on Your Team

December 28, 2022/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Leadership, Project Management, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

blue grocery carts

The key to weaning squeaky wheels is to boost their confidence and make them more independent.

Your high-cost producers are in the upper-left corner of the leadership matrix. They deliver great results, but they consume a lot of your time and energy. The squeaky wheel is the epitome of a high-cost producer. They need to be weaned off of taking up all of your time.

Your goal with a squeaky wheel is to make them more independent. Make their check-ins less frequent. Limit their ability to just drop in and talk. Provide them boundaries within which they’re expected to make decisions on their own. Try boosting their confidence in their abilities so they’ll be more independent.

To improve a squeaky wheel’s performance, leaders must take control of their interactions with them. Put structure to those interactions. Reduce the likelihood that they overuse informal channels with you, like sending you emails or just picking up the phone and calling. Give them clear parameters where they should act autonomously, and reward or praise them when they do.

I had one squeaky wheel on my team who was constantly in my office, and I would always talk with him because he was delivering great results and working on cool projects. Eventually I figured out how much of my time he was consuming, and I decided to make a change. I went to him and said, “Hey, from now on, any decision that’s below $50,000 you need to make it. Just tell me after you’ve made it. I trust that you’re gonna make the right call. When it’s above $50,000, make sure you involve me earlier.”

What happened was all those small decisions were no longer coming across my desk. All that time I had previously been spending on $5,000 or $10,000 decisions became my time again that I could spend somewhere else. The benefit of more effectively leading a squeaky wheel and weaning them off of the need to see you and talk with you all the time is that you reclaim your leadership capital. You can invest that leadership capital in other team members who need it more. You’re also building this individual’s self-sufficiency. You set them up for success and encourage them to be a higher performer on their own.

With a squeaky wheel, the sooner you can pull back from the amount of time and energy you invest in them, the faster you’ll be able to reinvest that time and energy in other members of your team.

Want to learn more about developing your team? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to assess and improve your strategic plans. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!

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Building Creative Stamina: Three Keys to Strength Training for Adults

May 23, 2022/1 Comment/in Balanced Lifestyle, Books, Career, Entrepreneur, Guest Blogger, Innovation, Leadership, Training /by Trevor Jones

painted hands

Creativity is a skill that can be built like any other. Understanding your passion and challenging the voices in your head that say “no” are a great way to start.

Today’s post is by Jane Dunnewold, author of Creative Strength Training (CLICK HERE to get your copy).

Maybe it’s disingenuous to say that each of us has the potential to be a creative genius. Gifts of personality are dispensed in varied measures at birth. Humans are tangled balls of social conditioning, reactions to environment, and serendipity. Life isn’t fair. Luck plays a part. We’ve all heard someone say, “I was in the right place at the right time” or “I never get lucky.”

As far as creativity is concerned, most people believe you’ve either got it or you don’t. I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard someone say wistfully, “I’m not creative.” When I hear a statement like that, I think to myself, “No one has ever shown you where to begin.”

Because the fact is, creativity, like any skill, can be cultivated. It takes a healthy combination of self-knowledge and stamina.

Athletes have an advantage: prescribed methods of building stamina, because physical prowess is revered by our culture. Hire a personal trainer and you’ll start with a series of exercises done repetitively – gradually adding reps as the body gains strength. Exercise is specific, varied, and involves what’s called cross training. One day a session of running to work cardio. Next time? Yoga to maximize flexibility. A steady, balanced program of activity keeps the human machine functioning at its optimal level.

So what about the rest of us? How can we engage creatively with what we care about – whether it’s a job or an avocation? And just as important – how can we identify what works against building creative stamina in every aspect of our lives?

I teach artists how to build stamina through what I call “creativity strength training” but the fact is, the lessons apply to everyone.

Here are three aspects of thinking more creatively each of us can embrace.

The Inner Rebel

Read more

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The Power of Self Reliance for Adversity in Modern Times

April 25, 2022/0 Comments/in Leadership, Training /by Trevor Jones

parthenon

Inner resilience is the secret to outer results.

Today’s post is by thoughtLEADERS instructor Jan Rutherford.

What role does character, courage and virtue play in business achievement, and how should we deal with the difficulties, obstacles and adversity we inevitably face?

Napoleon held, “Adversity is the midwife of genius.” An alternate expression for adversity is crucible, and the Oxford English Dictionary defines ‘crucible’ as “a melting pot, for metals, etc.,” and adds that it can be figuratively used for a “severe trial.” The term crucible represents a difficult test or challenge; some sort of place or situation where we may face the intense heat of a severe trial, one that forces us to change or make difficult decisions. As Jules Evans says, “God sends adversity your way like a boxing coach sending you a sparring partner.”

Socrates and many philosophers influenced by him believed there was a strong connection between how we interpret the world and our own physical and mental health, and he believed we have the power to heal ourselves. The reason Napoleon saw adversity as a benefit was because the virtues of wisdom and knowledge stem from resiliency, dominion and discipline.

Answering the questions about virtues amidst adversity takes time, energy, courage, humility and discipline – i.e., self-reliance. One of the most important components of our own personal development is the desire to build our character to serve others: inner growth for outer service.

Read more

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3 Steps for Protecting Your Most Important Asset

January 10, 2022/0 Comments/in Guest Blogger, Leadership, Training /by Trevor Jones

number 3

Today’s guest post is from Joel Garfinkle, thoughtLEADERS instructor, executive coach and author of Getting Ahead: Three Steps to Take Your Career to the Next Level (CLICK HERE to get your copy).

Are you protecting your most important asset?  No, it’s not your buildings, your equipment, or your investment accounts. It’s your people. Especially those rising stars whose contributions affect your bottom line and your future success.

The true cost of losing an employee goes largely unrecognized in many companies. Are you paying attention to this cost? Some managers shrug off this expense as a normal cost of doing business. Because there is no mechanism in place to compute the actual cost, the reality of the loss does not get reported to top management or discussed in terms of its strategic impact. But you can change all that.

Here’s the caveat: you need to be proactive. Don’t wait until turnover costs spiral out of control before you develop and implement a retention program. Start by mentally separating your employees into three categories:

– top performers
– mid-level performers
– lowest performers

While you may ultimately need to replace those in the third category, let’s concentrate on the other two. There are three important ingredients in an effective employee retention strategy: Read more

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Overcoming Obstacles to Creating a High-Performing Culture

December 8, 2021/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Communications, Leadership, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

stone obstacle

Learn about four of the most common obstacles to creating a high-performance culture and how to overcome them.

You’ll face many common obstacles on your path to building a high-performance culture. Legacy culture issues, associates who resist the new culture, and processes or behaviors that don’t yet exist are going to slow you down. You need to work through these counter-culture moments and issues if you’re looking to change the overall culture of the organization. The more aware you are of what these pitfalls are, the more quickly you’re going to be able to overcome them.

Legacy culture issues

One of the four most common pitfalls I see is the legacy culture. “This is the way we’ve always done things.” Read more

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Four Ways to Become a Complete Leader

November 15, 2021/0 Comments/in Books, Business Toolkit, Career, Entrepreneur, Guest Blogger, Innovation, Leadership, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

Stop beating yourself up for what you don’t do well—be a complete leader. Great leaders build processes that leverage their teammates’ strengths.

Today’s guest post is by Xavier Naville, author of The Lettuce Diaries: How a Frenchman Found Gold Growing Vegetables in China (CLICK HERE to get your copy).

The caller ID stated “Mike.” The phone was on the fourth ring. I held it in front of me, watching the screen, mouth dry, sitting at my desk, thinking, “Here it goes again. He’s going to speak Chinese and I won’t understand.”

Creative Food, the vegetable-processing company I had started in China the year before, was on the verge of bankruptcy. Every project I initiated had failed. All the foreign experts I had hired had left. My operations were in such bad shape that my own customers, who included big fast-food chains like KFC and Pizza Hut asked my new recruits why they had come aboard a ship that was sure to sink. On that day, once I finally answered the phone, I had to ask Mike to repeat himself several times. Read more

https://i0.wp.com/www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/20211114-Four.jpg?fit=1920%2C1280&ssl=1 1280 1920 Trevor Jones https://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/logo.png Trevor Jones2021-11-15 08:00:062021-11-14 23:26:33Four Ways to Become a Complete Leader

Collaboration Is Difficult. This Unconventional Approach Makes It Easier

November 1, 2021/0 Comments/in Books, Career, Guest Blogger, Leadership, Strategy, Training /by Trevor Jones

 

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Collaboration is difficult, especially when the people involved have different interests, perspectives, and positions. A method called transformative facilitation can make it easier. 

Today’s guest post is by Adam Kahane, author of Facilitating Breakthrough: How to Remove Obstacles, Bridge Differences, and Move Forward Together (CLICK HERE to get your copy).

The most straightforward way to get something done is just to do it, or to get other people to do it in the way you think it should be done. You can do this by forcing people gently or harshly, making use of your authority, brilliance, money, or other inducements. This way of getting things done often works, and in many contexts, it’s the default.

In many other situations, however, using force doesn’t and cannot work because getting something done requires other people to come along, and they aren’t willing to. So, an alternative approach is collaborating: a group of people getting things done by working together, with every person freely contributing what they think should be done.

The problem? Collaboration isn’t straightforward. It’s usually difficult—especially when the people involved have different interests, perspectives, and positions.

I’ve spent the past 30 years facilitating collaboration among diverse groups of people within and across organizations, including among people who don’t agree with or like or trust one another, but who nevertheless are trying to get things done by acting together because they can’t do so by acting separately.

What I’ve learned from this experience is that such collaboration is possible and can be highly creative and productive, but it requires an unconventional approach.

Start by finding a facilitator

A facilitator is someone who helps a group work together to effect change. This role can be played by a leader, executive, manager, consultant, coach, organizer, mediator, stakeholder, or friend; you can play this role, or someone else or several people can.

The word group is both a singular and plural noun, and a facilitator’s task is to help both the singular group as a whole and the plural members of the group. This is the core tension underlying all facilitation.

Some facilitators deal with this tension by focusing primarily on the first part of this task: helping the group as a whole address the problematic situation that has motivated their collaboration, often using an authoritative, top-down, “vertical” approach.

Other facilitators focus primarily on the second part: helping the individual members of the group address the diverse aspects of the situation that they find problematic. Top-down, vertical messaging gives way to openly shared ideas and opinions, a more “horizontal” approach.

These two approaches, the vertical and the horizontal, are the most common and conventional approaches to facilitation. Both have their proponents and methodologies. The upsides of vertical facilitation are coordination and cohesion, but the downsides are rigidity and domination. The upsides of horizontal facilitation are autonomy and variety, yet the downsides are fragmentation and gridlock. Both approaches can help a group collaborate to create change, but both also have limits and risks.

The solution? Choose both

The approach to facilitation that I’ve found to be most effective doesn’t choose between the vertical or the horizontal; it chooses both. This method, called transformative facilitation, produces progress by employing the vertical and the horizontal alternatively, the same way breathing doesn’t choose between inhaling and exhaling but doing both in succession.

More specifically, the facilitator explains, guides, and models five pairs of alternating moves:

  1. Advocating and inquiring. Often, both the participants and the facilitator start off a collaboration with the confident vertical perspective: “We have the right answer. Let’s get everyone in line.” Each person thinks, “If only the others would agree with me, then the group would be able to move forward together quickly and easily.”

But when the group takes this position too far or for too long and starts to get stuck in rigid certainty, the facilitator needs to help participants move toward horizontal plurality. When participants are pounding the table, certain that they have the right answer, the facilitator can encourage them to add “In my opinion” to the beginning of each sentence, and if that’s insufficient, to try “In my humble opinion.”

These playful modifications open the door to inquiry and discussion. Then, when the participants take this horizontal “We each have our own answer” too far and for too long and start to get stuck in cacophony and indecision, the facilitator helps them move toward the clarity and decisiveness of vertical unity.

  1. Concluding and advancing. Typically, both participants and the facilitator start with the vertical belief, “We need to agree.” Yet when a group gets stuck in this demand for a conclusion, the facilitator needs to help them keep moving. One of my most important learnings as a facilitator has been that, to move forward together, agreement isn’t required as often or on as many matters as most people think.

Then, when participants start to get stuck in the unfocused horizontal “We each just need to keep moving,” the facilitator needs to help people pause to work out what they can agree to focus on.

  1. Mapping and discovering. Many participants and facilitators start off a collaboration with an assured vertical perspective: “We know the way.” But when they start to get stubbornly stuck, the facilitator needs to help participants experiment, test their understandings, and discover new options.

Later, when the participants start to get stuck in the horizontal “We’ll each just find our way as we go,” the facilitator can help them map out a common way forward.

  1. Directing and accompanying. When participants and the facilitator start a collaboration thinking, “Our leaders will decide,” they may get stuck in ineffective, vertical bossiness. When this happens, the facilitator needs to help all participants take responsibility for their own actions.

Then, when the participants start to get stuck in the misaligned, horizontal “We each need to decide for ourselves,” the facilitator should help them align their actions.

  1. Standing outside a problematic situation and standing inside it. In most cases, participants and the facilitator start a collaboration chanting the vertical mantra, “We must fix this.” But when they take this position too far or for too long and get stuck in cold remoteness, the facilitator needs to help participants consider how they are part of the problem and therefore have the leverage to be part of the solution.

Later, when the participants start to get stuck in the self-centered and myopic horizontal “We must each put our own house in order,” the facilitator can help them stand outside the situation to get a clear, nonpartisan, and neutral perspective on what’s happening.

Through this process of alternating between the plural and singular, a group can make progress. They can collaborate to get things done in spite of—and also because of—their diversity and differences. This approach isn’t straightforward, but it works.

facilitating breakthroughADAM KAHANE is director of Reos Partners, an organization that helps people move forward together on their most important and intractable issues. He has worked in more than 50 countries with teams of leaders from business, government, and civil society, and his methods have been praised by Nobel Peace Prize–winners Nelson Mandela and Juan Manuel Santos. He is the author of five books, including his newest release, Facilitating Breakthrough: How to Remove Obstacles, Bridge Differences, and Move Forward Together. Learn more at adamkahane.com.

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