Eradicate
Assumptions to Reinvent Strong, Trusting Team Relationships
Keith Rosen
Learn how to eradicate the judgment you place on others
by challenging
the way you brand your people and the costly assumptions
you make about them.
Stop Branding Your People – Part 4 (Excerpt from Keith’s
upcoming book, Coachquest.)
In the spirit of believing that you’ve ‘tried
everything,’ take a look at
the following coaching questions and do an honest,
self-assessment when asking yourself,
“Have I actually asked these specific questions, in this
specific order, and in this specific way,
using this exact wording in the questions I ask?”
Yes or no. There’s no maybe here. There’s no, “I do
something similar.” That’s the point.
Execution and precision in the language of coaching and
leadership is everything.
After all, the quality of the answers you get is based on
the quality of the questions you ask.
These questions that follow will facilitate a
conversation and create new outcomes you’ve probably never experienced. But
that’s the point; and the opportunity for you to re-brand people, situations,
experiences, and ultimately, the stories you and possibly this individual have
created
about themselves and others, along with the ones you both
want to create for yourselves.
In essence, here’s your chance to establish a new
baseline of who the person is
and who they want to be, as well as who you want them to
be. And that includes you as well!
The intention of these questions is for them to share
with you what they are feeling,
as well as their experiences surrounding those feelings
and assumptions.
So remember, you’re not just looking to seek out the facts but
what is surrounding the facts,
the meaning and feelings that exist, which have
created either the positive
or negative experience the person and you describe.
Here are the questions and steps to challenge the
branding of others and create a new possibility. Remember, silence creates the
space needed for people to process and self-assess.
So, give the person the time and opportunity to self-reflect
and respond to these questions
on their terms, not yours. In order to provide some
context, imagine there is an employee
who harbors the following belief and has this concern.
My Boss Is
Uncoachable and Is Not Open to Feedback
Here are questions you can then use to facilitate an
entirely different conversation.
Keep in mind, this is just one example of how to
facilitate a coaching conversation that would
result in a new way of thinking and outcome for the
coachee, and for you.
So, what’s going on?
Why do you feel this way? What feelings come up around
this?
(Complete the sentence, “I feel ___.”)
Are the things that you’re sharing with me actually all
happening and factual?
Do you believe it’s true?
How do you know it’s true?
What possible assumptions are being made around this
specific situation,
without the evidence to support them?
What if it weren’t true? What would that mean to you?
What else could be true?
Ideally, what would you want to be true? How would you
want it to be?
Here’s the coaching moment. Now, ask the person to
reverse their statement, observation or truth.
For example. Let’s take the prior example.
My boss is uncoachable and is not open to feedback.
If we look at other possibilities and change the
statement, they could sound like this.
And as you can see, there’s not just one way to interpret
it.
My boss is coachable and open to feedback.
My boss is uncoachable and open to feedback.
My boss is coachable and not open to feedback.
My boss is coachable and is not open to my feedback.
My boss is coachable if I did a better job Coaching Up
and resetting expectations with him/her.
My boss is coachable and is open to my feedback.
My boss is coachable and I am not open to his
feedback.
I am coachable and open to my boss’s feedback.
I am not coachable nor open to feedback because
of past experiences.
I am coachable but not open to my boss’s feedback
because I’m unsure what his/her intentions really are.
Beliefs Always Precede Your Experiences
Interesting line of various truths that can co-exist or
be possible here!
The question is, which one do you want to create?
Assumptions have now been brought to the surface,
revealing the fact that there may be
another explanation or outcome that can be created or one
that has been missed.
The objective here is for the individual to be able to
expand their peripheral view,
remove the myopic blinders they’ve developed,
challenge these assumptions and create a new possibility
and outcome.
The real lesson here is, regardless of how you brand
someone,
there are many assumptions being made that we collapse as
factual and as such,
intentions on either side are not as clear as they could
be.
How do people know what your intentions are if you’re not
clear about them?
And if you’re not clear about your intentions, then the
human condition kicks in and people
always default to fear or the worst possible scenario
before validating their case or beliefs!
This approach now becomes your opportunity to reinvent
the relationships you have
with those you’ve branded as well. Imagine if you simply
share or use this one strategy
with those people who you may struggle with? What if you
became insatiably curious for a moment and authentically cared enough to want
to arrive at a deeper understanding of their point of view around any situation?
And if they agree with this line of thinking and methodology,
then you have already taken the first bold step to strip
away the old paint from the canvass
and start with a fresh new surface that will allow you to
paint a new picture and re-create
the type of relationship that you would ideally want,
rather than continuing to walk into
every conversation believing that you ‘already know’ the
outcome.
Here’s were yet another universal law applies. How
you think, is what you will get.
Said a different way, what we focus on grows and then
gets manifested in our lives. The greater cost is, we then make decisions and
choices around the very assumptions or judgments we’ve created. For example,
“Because of the way they are, they’ll never get the promotion they want.”
As we brought this conversation to it’s conclusion (if
you’ve been following the initial story line
I wrote about in Part 1) that started during the initial
training experience I was describing,
this was a very powerful team coaching moment for all of
the managers participating. They got it. Now, I didn’t say they liked the
answer but then again, as a coach, I’m not paid to be popular, nor am I hired
to tell people what they already know. And I’m able to achieve this, as any
good coach can, without ever making anyone wrong. Why? Because I don’t brand
nor judge others!
And yes, the HR Director made it a point to tell me how
much this conversation resonated with her.
After all, role of a transformational coach and leader is
to create the space for new possibilities
to emerge for every leader, and for those “difficult”
people who they initially branded.
Now, they have an opportunity to re-brand and re-set
relationships and expectations
with each person they interact with, one conversation at
a time.
Tags: Accountability, assumptions, Communication, Executive
Coaching, Sales Coaching
http://keithrosen.com/2016/02/eradicate-assumptions-to-reinvent-strong-trusting-team-relationships/#sthash.Zl1Q7Gsz.dpuf
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