Did You Set Clear Expectations?

Whether you’re leading a small department or a large organization, there’s never a shortage in things that need your attention… Even after those business owners and executives we’ve been looking at have invested the time and energy into leading their teams effectively and ensuring the leaders around them have the right tools to support the people who are counting on them, the work still isn’t done! If they haven’t been extremely clear about the expectations they have for how those tools should be applied and the results that need to be achieved in order to get a tangible return on investment, the odds of actually seeing those results are slim.

Picture this: you have a crew of carpenters who have traditionally used mostly hand tools and a few corded power tools. They’re about to begin a large project where they won’t have access to electricity and the foreman comes to you with a request to purchase a few thousand dollars worth of new battery powered tools, suggesting that this may save time and eliminate the expense of renting/operating a generator for the length of the project. Do you approve the purchase?

Maybe? Maybe not… In nearly two decades with a large manufacturing facility, I saw the standard practice for approving requests similar to that be to require a detailed explanation of how the investment would pay for itself within 18-24 months and be an overall reduction in costs moving forward. Even when the numbers lined up on paper, there was still the matter of making sure those same numbers held true in reality - but that’s a story for another day…

For the sake of time here and now, let’s say the foreman did provide us with a thorough enough explanation for how those new tools would save time and cut costs on the upcoming job to justify the purchase. We purchased the tools and sent them on their way. A few weeks into the project, we visit the jobsite and notice that all those new tools are still in the original packaging. Further, it appears that the crew is already falling way behind on the expected timeline. When we question the foreman about the progress, he explains that it’s because they don’t have electricity at the jobsite and that they haven’t taken the time to start using the new tools yet.  What do we do?

I realize this is a far-fetched example. I truly can’t imagine this ever actually happening on a construction site. But how often have we invested in tools, such as training and development courses, to help our leaders be more effective with their team members only to have them keep doing exactly what they’ve been doing? Not so far-fetched now, huh?

Once we’ve learned how to recognize what tools are needed and we’ve given our team members access to those tools, the next executive leadership skill we need to master is providing those same team members with very clear expectations as to how they should be using those tools and what results we need them to accomplish now that they have them! Let’s be honest, it’s often easier to muddle through the same old problems than it is to do the hard work of changing our behavior. Without setting those clear expectations for what needs to change as well as the results that should come from those changes, those tools may never be taken out of the box…

With clear expectations in place, we’re on the right path. But there’s still one more thing a strong leader will need to do if they want to make sure they’re building a great leadership culture and their team has bought in so we’ll close the loop with that next time.