Communication Drives Positive Performance
Leading a team in any organization is demanding. It requires being vigilant, communicating well, understanding interdependencies, creating alignment, keeping track of progress, and understanding obstacles that may require resources beyond your control. You also need to keep your team engaged and your manager informed.
Yet, while you may hit all the marks of keeping your team and manager well informed, you may be missing the target with your organizational peers.
As an executive coach, I’ve seen this perceptual gap often when the leader I coach receives input from peers through 360 assessments or stakeholder interviews that capture a broad view of how the leader performs.
In my experience, both as a coach and former HR VP, the lowest ratings of a leader’s performance are often received by peers, as opposed to the direct manager, direct reports, indirect reports or others participating in assessing the leader’s performance. (Although I’ve also seen each of these groupings have the lowest scores on some individual leader’s ratings.)
There are assorted reasons peers may rate other leaders lower, among them:
- Communications gap – Peers have their own team to manage or functional goals that they are striving to achieve. They don’t know the difficulty of your goals or how you plan to achieve them, other than some high-level details you periodically share in staff meetings.
- Competing for resources – Peers may believe you have more resources, including people and/or budget, to accomplish your goals than they do.
- What others are saying – Peers may hear things from people on your team or others who give them a one-sided impression of how things are going or how they can be improved on your team.
- Objectives not met – Slippage on a key goal may negatively affect your peers or the organization, raising questions of your leadership.
To some extent, the reasons peers rate each other lower is consistent with an axiom I learned from Hogan Assessments that addresses reputation versus identity: Others view leaders based on how they perceive their influence and their interactions with the leader, as well as external feedback received about the leader (reputation); individuals, however, see themselves based on their own personality, skills and behaviors (identity).
In general, individuals tend to overestimate their own abilities and contributions (identity) while underestimating those of others (reputation), and this can lead to misunderstandings and conflicts.
More than ever, teams or functions rely on other parts of the organization to deliver their required goals for the enterprise to run smoothly. This requires horizontal communication with peers, especially where interdependencies exist. Failure to keep others informed can lead to missed deadlines, lost revenue, poor coordination or lackluster impressions of your leadership by your peers.
Good leaders have a built-in cadence of 1:1 meetings with their direct reports. These meetings, combined with staff meetings, tend to keep the team you lead informed, aligned, and accountable. However, other than attending the staff meetings held by the direct manager, many leaders miss the opportunity to communicate more effectively with the teams they are on.
The good news is that you can improve both your perception and performance through enhanced communication and collaboration with peers.
The most successful leaders communicate and collaborate well – not only with the team they lead, but also with the team(s) they are on.
Establishing an appropriate cadence of 1:1 meetings with peers can serve to better understand each other’s goals, opportunities and needs. This allows you to identify areas where you can potentially support each other or collectively plan to mitigate issues. If needed, you can partner on how to escalate matters to get back on track or prepare alternatives without creating a finger pointing exercise. This type of peer collaboration builds trust and can better serve your leadership and the organization.
There are additional strategies to help build relationships that benefit you and your peers, as well as the organization. Some of these will emerge based on the 360 or stakeholder interviews that an executive coach conducts. You can then move forward with a targeted action plan based on actual feedback to drive positive performance and fuel your success.
How can executive coaching help you or your organization create greater collaboration and better communication channels to achieve your objectives more effectively?
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Lance Hazzard, PCC, CPCC, is a certified Executive Coach and Executive Team Coach helping people and organizations achieve success. Lance and Eric T. Hicks, Ph.D., co-authored Accelerating Leadership, published in June 2019. Lance is Executive Coach and President at Oppnå® Executive & Achievement Coaching. More information on the book, Lance and Oppnå® Coaching can be found at the links below: