147. The Accountability Tightrope: How to Hold High Standards Without Killing Team Morale

Transcript – Episode 147: The Accountability Tightrope: How to Hold High Standards Without Killing Team Morale

Joe: It’s okay to have an open door policy. It’s okay to tell your folks: if you need something, come see me. I am here for you. I want you to do that. But I also want you to get up from behind your desk and go do rounding. Go have conversations with people. Go and ask.

Joe: Hello again, boss heroes, and welcome back to Boss Better Now. As I shared in our last episode, we’re doing something a little bit different this summer. A few weeks back, I held a webinar for subscribers to my Boss Better email newsletter on a challenge that a lot of leaders struggle with: how do you hold employees to high standards of performance at work while also being the kind of compassionate, supportive leader that people love working for? This is a balancing act that I sometimes refer to as the accountability tightrope. This webinar was a one-hour dive into the habits, the mindset, and the best practices for doing just that — holding people to high standards while deepening and not damaging the relationships that make great teams possible. We’re sharing this webinar with you over the summer across four parts. So as this summer unfolds, I hope you enjoy learning how to navigate the accountability tightrope. And if you want to be sure not to miss future special webinar events like this and other things we’ve got going on, make sure you subscribe to my Boss Better email newsletter. It’s free. Just go to bossbetternow.com to subscribe. And now here’s part two of the accountability tightrope.

Joe: Have you ever known a leader who was too hard, too tough, too demanding? What did they do or not do? Why might this kind of leadership style be ineffective? Again, in live training, when I ask this question to leaders in a room, the answers are what you can probably imagine. This is a leader who shows up with unreasonable demands. This is a leader who ignores the very real obstacles we face in getting things done and just says, “Just make it happen.” They’re not available. They’re unapproachable. They don’t consult. They provide little or no guidance. They expect perfection. This kind of leadership style can kill morale on a team — but in a different way than the protector mindset we discussed in part one. And this leadership style too has a name. It is referred to as the enforcer mindset.

Joe: An enforcer mindset is a leadership approach characterized by impatient expectations, an overreliance on self-sufficiency, and where performance is expected with not enough guidance or support. When we see leaders operating from this style, we see them expecting people to be knowledgeable and capable immediately with minimal ramp-up. These kinds of leaders treat people as being fully responsible for their own learning, their own education — it is primarily the employee’s job to teach themselves how to do what they need to do, or they should have walked through the door already knowing it. This is a leader who sometimes sets expectations with limited follow-up or coaching, and their way to address gaps or issues is simply through correction rather than through development. A leader operating from an enforcer mindset tends to be highly focused on results and outcomes and doesn’t really spend time in the nuance or the journey to get there. They tend to be less intentional about relationship building or mentoring.

Joe: This is a leader who is operating with high standards but without the support or the grace that tends to lead people to feel safe and like they can work on things and do well. What ends up happening when you have high accountability and not enough support is that people end up feeling incompetent, or they feel like they don’t know where to go to get the information or resources they need to be successful. Eventually, people will shut down or operate from a place of self-preservation or fear. And typically we see people operating with little creativity and low energy. This is the boss sometimes who expects you to be a mind reader.

Joe: What if you’re someone who shows up with that enforcer mindset? You drift in that direction. You have those high standards, but you’re still not getting the performance that you need from people. Well, maybe we need to try adding some meaningful support. What are some ways to do that? For one, are we engaging in regular check-ins and coaching, not only having problem-driven interactions? Are we expecting people to walk through the door as fully formed, completely knowledgeable, wholly developed contributors? Probably not a good idea. Most people aren’t going to show up that way. Many of you know I do a lot of work in healthcare, and I’ve often asked a leader: do you expect something different from a nurse with six years of experience versus a nurse with six months of experience? And the answer is always yes. So we have to think about what the on-ramp is to the highest level of performance and what the different mile markers are on that journey for folks.

Joe: I would also encourage you to look for ways to use “we” and “let” and collaborative language — to make it feel like you are standing alongside that person and troubleshooting with them, not leaving them always to figure it out on their own. I also want to encourage you to look for ways that you can praise progress and effort and learning, not just outcomes. It’s not only about whether it was good or bad, right or wrong, complete or not complete. It’s: here’s what’s working. Here’s what we still need to pay more attention to. Here are the parts that are going really well. Here’s something to keep in mind as you move the rest of the way through this. We also have to normalize struggle. If we see people struggling, sometimes it’s okay to say to them, “Hey, this is hard. And it’s pretty normal that these things don’t come easily to everybody. So let’s talk about what you might need to get unstuck and what other resources are available to you, including me.” If you drift toward that enforcer mindset, really just adding some of those check-ins and offering people help is a great way to start to move away from that. Think about breaking things down into steps and look for ways to create open dialogue with your folks.

Joe: I’ve spent years doing leadership training all over the country, and one of the things I hear from leaders the most is when they brag about their open door policy. They’ll say, “I have an open door policy. I tell my team all the time — if you need something, you come see me and I am there for you. I have an open door policy.” And that’s great. You may not get as much done as you need to if people are constantly walking through your open door, so let me give you permission every once in a while to close the door and say, “Hey, I’ve got to get some things done — come see me later.” You’re allowed to do that.

Joe: But the other thing about the open door policy is that it builds entirely a system where you are transferring responsibility to them to come and tell you what they need, or if they’re struggling, or if they have a question. And there are a lot of people on teams who never will — because of power dynamics, or because of some very real hesitation that asking questions or looking like they need help or don’t know something will make them look less capable and they’ll be penalized. So if this is you, I want to encourage you to consider moving from a come-and-tell mentality to a go-and-ask mentality.

Joe: It’s okay to have an open door policy. It’s okay to tell your folks: if you need something, come see me. I am here for you. I want you to do that. But I also want you to get up from behind your desk and go do rounding. Go have conversations with people. Go and ask folks: hey, what’s going well for you? What do you need? What are you struggling with? If my job is to create the conditions here for you to thrive, I want to know — because I’m going to go fight like crazy to get you what you need to be successful. And that’s how you open up those lines of communication and create some of that high support that balances out those high standards.

Joe: Okay, boss heroes, that’s part two of the accountability tightrope. Make sure you hit that subscribe button because we’ve got part three coming your way in just a few days. And by the way, if this is the kind of programming you’d like to bring to the leaders in your organization — either as a meeting keynote or as a leadership development training — I can help you with that. Just go to joemull.com, fill out the contact form, and we’ll get in touch to have a conversation about ways that we can be of service to you. Thanks for listening, and remember: commitment comes from better bosses. See you next time.

Joe: Do you need to take your leadership knowledge and skills to the next level, but don’t have time for overpriced courses or lengthy training programs? Then you want to check out Boss Hero School. This immersive three-day leadership development experience with me is like getting an MBA in people leadership in just a couple of days. We’re going to teach you the methods and the mindset to create environments where people join, stay, care, and try. For more information, visit bossheroschool.com.