Happy new year!
And new year means it’s time to turn those thoughts you had over Christmas into action for the year ahead.
Normally that involves getting together with your leadership team, reviewing your strategy, determining where you want to lead the company to be in 12 months time and the initiatives to get you there and then communicating that out to the teams to get going.
And then most of the time, that wonderfully logical, structured and organised plan stalls. There’s questioning whispers about ‘why we’re doing that’, things being pointed out that haven’t been considered and lots of asks for more direction. Before you know it, that great plan is behind schedule and a couple of months later everyone is frustrated about the whole thing.
It doesn’t have to be like that — if you deliberately build trust into your planning process.
The three tips for how
- As a leader, worry about the why and the outcome — leave the what and how to your teams
- Create an opportunity for genuine challenge — don’t just tell
- Start small
Tip 1: Worry about the why and the outcome — leave the what and how to your teams
Most planning processes go too far in small groups. Our classic view of a leader’s role is to define the strategy and plan for the year ahead to enough detail that there is little ambiguity and teams can get on with doing a great job. Leaders are in that position because their experience and capability means they’re best placed to do that.
The way that often translates is that all of the harder ‘why’ discussion and thinking that formed the early part of that process is replaced in the communication and discussion by the ‘what’. The rich rationale is replaced by the dull details.
That’s just a story telling comms issue, right? I’d challenge you that it’s actually a planning process issue.
Your planning process is going too far. By the time you’re ready to communicate, you’ve determined the why, what, how and in doing so, only really placed any trust in your team for execution. You may well not mean it, but you are in effect saying that you are better placed to know how to make things better than they are, the people that do it day in and day out.
The first tip to reverse this actually involves you doing less — stop your planning process earlier. Once you’ve figured out the why and the outcome stop working in a small group and start communicating. Leave it to your teams to figure out the what and how. For example, you don’t need to get to a point where you determine that you need a new order fulfillment system — you only need to get to a point that you need to improve your on time order fulfillment.
The best way to judge when to stop is the point at which you still feel uncomfortable to do so. It’s a change, so if you don’t feel that discomfort it’s because you’ve still created enough certainty for you.
And when you communicate, focus on the problem and the outcome you need.Be transparent, share the details of why, what led you to that area of focus, why that area and not others. And then ask them what they need from you to deliver it.
For all the discomfort you feel, you’ll give your teams the space to not only use their front line knowledge, but also to feel the power of putting their own stamp on proceedings. That pride and boost you feel when you come up with the solution, they’ll feel it instead. The excitement of imaging the future — that can be theirs too.
If you’ve been really prescriptive in the past, expect a bit of a reaction and lots of questions, but hold your nerve. Trust your teams — they’ll deliver.
Tip 2: Create an opportunity for genuine challenge — don’t just tell
Challenge is good.
If you’ve just presented your plan for the year, it’s gone really well, there were a few questions but everyone seemed to take it in, then it’s much more likely that people aren’t prepared to challenge in that forum than you’ve got a perfect plan, perfectly explained. When was the last time you were told about a series of plans for the year ahead, and didn’t have hundreds of questions. For that matter, when was the last time you heard a government briefing on plans for the next 30 days and didn’t have hundreds of questions.
The other way of thinking about it is that if your plans didn’t really have anything that was worth challenging, then you weren’t saying anything. Think of those meetings that descend into generics ‘we should really look at increasing our margins’, or ‘we should make sure we’re looking after our people’s wellbeing’. If you are saying something of meaning, there will be a counter argument.
And it’s in those counter arguments that you develop understanding — your own and the wider teams. That ‘cynical’ person that always does raise those 1–2 questions just has the courage to ask and raise the things that those around them don’t.
Your job is to create the opportunities for those without the courage to raise their questions so they can feel heard and build their understanding. There are endless options for how (get in touch if you’re really struggling and want some ideas). One of my favourites is to get that ‘cynical’ person to live interview you and the team with free reign to ask anything about the plans they see fit.
If the thought of doing that is tiring — it’s probably just another indicator of tip 1 — you’ve gone too far through your planning process without involving others and in doing so, thought too much to a point you’re bored of the discussion.
Tip 3 — Start small
It doesn’t have to be all or nothing. If you aren’t sure, start with something small, something lower risk and see the results. In doing so, take note of where you feel most uncomfortable — it’ll be a good indication of what’s holding you back from putting more trust in your teams.
And don’t think this has to work for everything. There will be times where you do have to be more directive, or for good reason can’t give as much space and trust to your teams. The advantage of giving it where you can means that your team are much more likely to understand the instances where you can’t — you’ll have a track record to lean on.
Conclusion
Teams work best with high levels of trust — it allows them to just get on with stuff. High levels of trust come from the safety of feeling heard and knowing your voice matters. In the planning process, that means feeling part of it, not just like a recipient.
Building trust in your planning process means opening it up for the scrutiny it deserves — after all you are about to set the direction for thousands of hours and £ of work. Hopefully following these tips allows you to do just that, with the result that in 2021, your planning process isn’t the only that was better than 2020.
