This week’s reflection: Getting comfortable with discomfort Many conversations from last week dealt with the reluctance of really nice, well-intentioned, loyal and honest managers who struggle with holding difficult conversations in a timely and constructive way. They’ll acknowledge this comes from being conflict averse, not wanting to destabilise the team, not making mountains out of molehills, not wanting to get into arguments, not wanting to be seen as unreasonable, of not wanting to get the process wrong, and many other things. I accept all of that, no problem – but has the problem been fixed? The reason they were less likely to admit was anxiety. Not just aversion to conflict, but fear of conflict, of maybe being wrong. I sensed discomfort with them taking a superior position, of being thrown curve balls they can’t answer, of “losing the argument”, of looking silly, of being busy with other things, and many other diversions and worries about what might go wrong. And so nothing gets done, or if it does, it is so tentative as to be a negotiation they are bound to lose, reinforcing those fears and shifting power and respect further away from themselves. I remembered an advertising slogan, “friends don’t let drunk friends drive”, or words to that affect. The advertisements showed a young person taking the car keys off a friend who insisted they are fine to drive, but probably wasn’t. Its message was that if you are really their friend, you’ll act to save their life, even if that’s uncomfortable or risks confrontation. That as a friend, you do hard things to help other friends. That doing the right thing might mean getting uncomfortable.
This thinking is critical for managers who are genuinely nice people too. By not speaking up because it’s stressful for them, they are unable to save a career, job, accident or life. What sort of manager or friend puts their own fear of discomfort ahead of the welfare of the people they should be supporting and protecting? What will they say when a chain of responsibility investigation shows they didn’t act when they ought to have? What will they say to someone’s loved ones if the worse happens because they stood by? Examples spoken about including not enforcing site rules, not addressing dishonesty then and there, not setting and maintaining clearly defined standards that apply equally to all, not shutting down the activities of people who didn’t follow safety processes, and so on. There are also canny employees turn the managers’ good nature against them, pushing soft boundaries, treating rules as recommendations, and generally negotiating their way into doing what they wanted, not what the employee and its customers needed. And, just liked spoiled children, not appreciating the latitude they had been granted, while the high performers get resentful that the con-artists and whingers are getting away with it. In the meantime, the manager tries to keep everyone happy, but fails, with lost respect, lowering standards and poor productivity accompanied by increasing unrest and turnover.
The challenge for these lovely managers is to recognise that as a really nice person, a good friend, and a great supporter with their employee’s best interests at heart, they owe it to each team member to have the tough conversations. To use their natural empathy, understanding and compassion, not as an excuse for avoidance, but as a reason for action, using “why” more than simply “what”. This is not about the manager’s power – this is their responsibility. How will those conflict-avoidant managers feel if an employee loses their opportunities, job or life because the manager was, to not put too fine a point on it, weak? To be so scared of what might go wrong, or how stressful that moment might be for them that they don’t pursue what is right and necessary, for everyone? To get comfortable with uncomfortable conversations. That’s the big point – getting comfortable with their responsibility to have uncomfortable conversations, and then having the best, most constructive conversation they can have to help that person find success and fulfilment in their job. There are lots of tactics that can make that a lot easier, and maybe that’s a subject for another day, but if the manager doesn’t even try, tactics don’t even come into it. I guess the bigger point my reflection arrived at was how we all need to find our own way of getting comfortable with being uncomfortable, and how that is a bigger subject with greater life implications. All our personal growth comes from getting outside of our comfort zones. Along the way we risk making mistakes – but so what? How can that be worse than not trying? For these example though, the questions remains: How can we help people if we don’t do and say what they really need us to do and say, rather than what appeases them or excuses us in the moment?
