What if it's Me?

In my post Are You a Coachable Leader, I talk about how my executive coaching success rate hovers around 50%. Half of the managers I coach genuinely want to develop their leadership skills, and go on to achieve great success. The other half? They usually get fired. Unfortunately, the latter was the case for a manager I was coaching up until last week. Her termination was inevitable for a couple of reasons. A big part of it, however, was her refusal to ask herself one critical, but tough question: “What if it’s me?”

The writing had been on the wall for over a year. The majority of people didn’t trust this leader, as was confirmed by both her Leadership Development Assessment (360) and Employee Engagement Survey results. Instead of asking herself why people didn’t trust her, and what she could do to fix it, she remained stubbornly convinced other factors were causing the problem – not her.

Repairing broken trust may be one of the most difficult leadership pitfalls to overcome. Although I have blogged on this topic before, in this case, it’s worth doing a post-mortem. How did this manager manage to break down trust to the point of getting fired?

She believed she was smarter than everyone else on the team…including her boss and boss’ boss
Took the credit for success
Lacked accountability: Consistently bad mouthed others and gave everyone else a healthy portion of blame
Outright lied and clouded intent by delivering different messages to different people
Discounted the feedback and concerns of others, and had plenty of explanations for why her scores were low (none of which involved her)
Controlled information: Did not empower her managers or employees to talk to others or make decisions
Missed important meetings where she would be forced to talk about inconsistencies in communication or decisions
Took her employees and peers for granted
Lacked self-confidence and was never able to even ask the question, “What if is me?”
Made substantially unethical decisions

This leader had a prescription of exactly what she needed to do to rebuild trust with her team and others in the organization. We discussed it every month. And every month, this manager would say, “I’m doing exactly what you told me to do.” Unfortunately, she was lying to herself. She wasn’t doing what was outlined in her action plan, and team members confirmed the lack of alignment between what she said she was doing and her actions.

Could this manager have rebuilt the trust she lost? In this case, no, and number 10 on the long list of transgressions in the reason why. When you make unethical decisions and they are uncovered, any credible senior leadership team will make the decision to immediately fire the manager in question.

Short of making such egregious mistakes, leaders can rebuild lost trust. It isn’t easy, and it isn’t quick, but if you as a leader are committed to making changes, you can turn the situation around and go on to become a strong and successful leader.

Ask and answer the question, “What if it’s me?” Until you’re prepared to answer this question honestly and take responsibility for how others see you are a leader, you don’t stand a chance of re-building trust with your direct reports or others in your organization. Likewise, if you answer the question with a resounding “NO,” you’ll always find someone else to blame for your leadership downfalls.

Genuinely care about your people. When you truly care about your people, you don’t lie to them or cloud the intent of your communication. You make decisions that are in alignment with the vision and values of your organization. These decisions are usually in the best interests of the customer and the long-term best interests of the employees and the organization.

Trust yourself and then trust others. When you trust yourself, you know that you can figure out or fix almost any problem in your area of responsibility. Most importantly, it is only when you trust yourself and trust others that you can allow people to take responsibility, be accountable, and make decisions on behalf of you and the team. Realize that you don’t have all the answers for everything, and ask your team members for their ideas and input. They were hired for their expertise and talent. When leaders ask for input it shows they trust their employees and this in turn helps employees feel they are valued and can trust their manager.

Don’t rely on your title. Great leaders build relationships where others want to follow in the direction they are going. If the only thing you have to rely on is your title to get things done, you might be a manager, but you will never be a trusted leader.

Be grateful: value and appreciate your team members. Leaders who value and appreciate others have consciously thought, “What happens if no one on my team shows up tomorrow?” If no one is following you, you’re not a leader. Rewarding and recognizing success is really important, so recognize and reward success every chance you get. Being appreciative of your team members is critical to creating a trusting relationship where employees can genuinely say, “I love my job and where I work.”

Over communicate. Deliver consistent messages, regardless of the person on the receiving end. Honest, direct, timely, and consistent communication breeds trust.

Be honest when it costs you something to be honest. The only time you gain points for being honest is when it costs you something. To take responsibility and say, “I screwed up and didn’t handle this well and for that I apologize,” costs you something. It also makes a significant difference in the level of trust you earn.

Ask for feedback. Let people know you’re aware that your actions have eroded the trust of the team and you are working hard to rebuild it. Ask people for honest feedback on what actions you’re taking are working well for the team and what people think you could do differently to be an even stronger leader.

Be vulnerable. People find it easier to trust you when you are transparent. When you have the ability to say, “I don’t know the answer,” or, “I might be wrong,” or, “I made a mistake and I am glad you covered for me,” people know that you are human. People who have a high need to defend what they did wrong are not trusted.

Recognize that rebuilding trust is going to take a long period of time. Most people who have been burned by a leader are not going to respond well when the leader says something along the lines of, “From this point forward, you can trust me.” To expect anything less than that rebuilding lost trust will take a lot of time only continues to undermine trust.

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Why do so many leaders fail, and what do the successful leaders do differently?

Thousands of business books tell you how to be a leader. Far fewer books delve into the surprisingly common mistakes many leaders unknowingly make that end up derailing their success. Using real scenarios and examples collected throughout their years of corporate and military leadership and management experience, Peter Stark and Mary Kelly pinpoint why some managers fail and what successful leaders do differently.