As teams get healthier, they become more willing to talk about the friction within their team and company.
In the beginning, teams often hesitate to say what’s really going on, they’re indirect, cloaking their message with too many words, often diluting the real message.
As leaders mature through our work together, they see their success tied directly to how effectively they communicate and manage expectations. This means they offer feedback quickly, specifically, and often. It takes practice and repetition, most of us weren’t taught to do this well.
I like to say it’s similar to taking a plane trip. Between departure and arrival, your plane is constantly adjusting for the inside and outside factors impacting your trip. Ideally, your trip is uneventful. Sometimes, significant changes happen, and course corrections are then more turbulent. If the pilots waited to course correct, we’d feel the impact and in time, reduce our trips or find another vehicle.
Your team is the same, the leaders owe it to them to seize the opportunities (often disguised as problems), communicating directly as often as necessary to adjust while managing expectations, ensuring we’re aligned for the greater good of all.
Waiting and posturing when challenges arise doesn’t work, turbulence follows, and opportunities lost.
“Opportunities are like sunrises. If you wait too long, you miss them.” William Arthur Ward