You Always Knew Where You Stood...

It was probably 2003 or 2004, when I was walking through a fairly secluded part of the facility I worked in and a friend pulled me aside to ask “Was that guy who just came through that Terry guy? I hear he’s a real &#%$@!” I confirmed that it had indeed been Terry and asked what the issue was. Terry and I, along with a few other safety team members, were doing a walk-through of that entire area to identify at-risk behaviors with hopes of addressing them and preventing potential injuries. He told me that Terry had gotten on him about not wearing safety glasses, something that was in fact required in the area where he was working.

Later that morning, I was able to catch up with Terry to get his version of the story. Terry explained that the fellow who stopped me, a long term employee and all around great guy, was fastening a banding strap around a box and had his safety glasses resting on top of his head. Terry simply tapped the side of his own safety glasses as a reminder for him to pull them down to actually cover his eyes. We both got a good laugh from how something that simple, coupled with the reputation Terry had somehow gotten for being a jerk, escalated so quickly.

The interesting part was that the only folks who seemed to buy into the idea that Terry was a jerk were the ones who had very limited interaction with him, or none at all. He was still considered a new guy, only being there a few years at that point, and being from “up north” just compounded the time it was taking for him to be accepted among the employees who had been working there since rocks were soft…

In complete transparency, Terry was certainly direct. If someone did something to put themselves or anyone at risk, he was quick to address it. That said, I can’t say that I ever saw him be rude in how he did that. (Remember a few posts back; Attack the Issue, Love the Person?) Terry was also the first manager I ever remember seeing stop people to commend them on things they were doing well! So regardless of what was going on, you always knew where you stood with him.

While he had that reputation of being a jerk among many of the folks who hadn’t worked directly with him, the team that he worked with on a daily basis absolutely loved him. And they would frequently go to bat for him when others were spreading any nonsense about him!

A year or two after the safety glasses incident, that same guy who pulled me aside was scheduled to attend a half day training session. I did the bulk of the session but Terry liked to take an hour block of the training so he could get to know the employees in areas he didn’t have direct responsibility for. (Yet another thing he did that was extremely rare for management team members…) When the session was over, my friend who had his glasses resting on his head a few years prior stuck around after to tell me he was really sorry he had said that about Terry and that he really respected him now that he had gotten to know him…

Terry provided me with a great example of why it’s so important to address issues immediately (Rip the Band-Aid Off), be very intentional about Attacking the Issue and Not the Person, and do that directly with the “smoker: rather than the entire group… We often hear people say they’re giving “constructive criticism” when they’re pointing out an issue. As Jeff Henderson went into more detail in Know What You’re FOR around his comment that “people who are believed in work hard than people who aren’t,” he suggested replacing the idea of “constructive criticism” with “alliance feedback.” His point was that when we believe in people, we should be working to build alliances that make us all better rather than criticizing them. That’s exactly what I watched Terry do so well all those years ago!

When we’re able to build this approach into our culture, wouldn’t it also stand to reason that the team around us would be made up of folks who work to exceed expectations on a daily basis?