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I learned a valuable lesson in how to deal with senior leadership yesterday, and I wanted to share it, in case any of you find yourself in a similar position.
The background:
I recently did a small audit for a mid-sized company—about 8,000 employees. I did some focus groups, some executive interviews, and analyzed their communication vehicles.
It was one of those rare and glorious occasions where my report actually landed on the desk of the CEO—who appreciated it so much he e-mailed me directly to thank me for doing the work.
In the report, I talked a lot about the breakdown in face-to-face communication at the company. The CEO himself was fantastic: he walked the factory floors, did lots of Town Halls, pressed the employee flesh, answered questions from employees via e-mail . . . I mean, this guy is a communicator's dream.
But it stopped with him. Other executives, as well as managers, supervisors, and team leaders weren't picking up the ball and running with it. As a result, a lot of employees weren't hearing messages they should have been hearing.
When he read my report, the CEO knew it was spot-on, and asked me if I would present it to a group of his senior people—about 15 plant managers, vice presidents, the CFO, etc. The CEO himself would be there as well.
So that's what I did. Now, I was very careful not to 'blame' anyone. I just talked about why they should take communication more seriously, revealed the results from the focus groups, talked about how the culture got to this point, offered some best practices from other companies on how to solve the problem, and then threw it open for discussion.
The idea being that after I outlined the problem, we would enlist the help of these leaders to fix it.
Well . . . I knew I was in trouble with one guy the minute I started talking. He had that look. If you do any consulting at all, you know that look. I call it the 'son of a bitch look.' As in, 'Who do you think you are, you son of a bitch? I've been at this company for 25 years and you do a couple of lousy focus groups and you're going to tell me something?'
Sure enough, as soon as I was done, this man spoke up. He didn't like being blamed for the negative culture. He didn't like me telling him he wasn't communicating. He started listing all the things he does—informal meetings, meetings, a white board on the factory floor where people could write questions and get answers by the next day, town halls, etc.
And as he was speaking, I realized the horrific mistake I had made. I had put him completely on the defensive. I forced him to defend himself in front of the CEO and his peers.
I didn't mean to. But I made the mistake of thinking that just saying, repeatedly, things like, 'Nobody is to blame,' and 'this isn't about blame, it's about moving forward,' and 'you're doing a lot of things, but maybe we could do them better if we talk about them,' that that would be enough to keep it all positive.
But of course it wasn't. Because while I was saying, 'nobody is to blame,' in the corporate world, someone is always to blame. I mean, it wasn't my fault the communication had broken down. It wasn't the CEO's fault. It wasn't the employees' fault. But it had to be somebody's fault, right?
So no matter how many times I said it wasn't about blaming someone, the people in the room probably felt that they were being blamed.
And that, friends, is lousy-ass consulting. We only had an hour to get some solutions on the table, and I had to spend 20 minutes wrestling the conversation away from the blame game and back to solving the problem.
I should have structured my entire presentation differently. I should have assumed that people in the room would be more defensive. I should have accounted for that. I could have defused the situation before ever starting the open discussion.
My bad.
Lesson learned: In corporate America, when you deliver bad news, someone is going to be defensive. Be ready for it, prepare for it, defuse it, and get ready to move on towards solutions.
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Feels like Total Recall. Er, Philip K Dick?
Actually, with Steve's example it's a bit scary --- standing at the urinal...
Comments (14)
Eileen,
Cranky-nasty-employee-woman works at my company, too! In several bodies, even. These are the people who make me want to jump out of my Corporate Communications Ivory Tower window some days. I like your suggestion of keeping her in mind while writing.
Posted by Shari S | April 22, 2005 10:54 AM
Posted on April 22, 2005 10:54
Steve,
I was in the bar in DC with the Appletini. And yes, both nights of the seminar...not that it affected my learning in the class!! If you ever make it down to San Antonio, Judy and I will take you out for drinks here!
I love reading your blog, so keep up the good work!
Sonya
Posted by Sonya | April 22, 2005 11:22 AM
Posted on April 22, 2005 11:22
I THOUGHT it was DC. That was fun. You know, San Antonio is the one city on my list that I want to see that I haven't (American cities, I mean). I'll have to figure out a way to get down there.
Steve
Posted by Steve C. | April 22, 2005 12:13 PM
Posted on April 22, 2005 12:13
Great post, Steve. I started (sort of) my career at McKinsey, where "how do we show them the opportunities without anyone feeling blamed for the unexploited opportunities?" was the big issue before any presentation.
Never easy to get that right, but I think your idea about how you would have done it, given another chance, is as good as it gets.
Posted by Allan Jenkins | April 22, 2005 12:33 PM
Posted on April 22, 2005 12:33
Steve, this lesson serves all of us in consulting, no matter the subject. This blog found me through several people, including my better half that is a communications and management consultant.
My first lesson in this behavior was in my very first gig. I am a security consultant and was looking into the documentation and follow-up of corrective actions within a utility security department. The documentation was great, but I couldn't find the follow-up. When I mentioned it in my exit briefing, my point of contact freaked out, got really defensive and said that I hadn't mentioned that to him (when in fact I had). The Director was great and told him to let me finish, that it was my report of the findings. Boy did that open my eyes. We talked it all our and everything worked out fine.
Lesson for me is to make sure certain participants are forewarned and understand the information to make the meetings as productive as possible.
Posted by Steve Meyer | November 28, 2005 11:43 AM
Posted on November 28, 2005 11:43
DATE: 04/21/2005 08:34:2P PM
I think that this is my greatest challenge as a writer too - to write in a way that won't elicit an eye roll or a "whatever" from cranky-nasty-employee-woman, who, I'd bet money, is related to this guy from your meeting Steve. In fact, they were probably separated at birth.
I have a few employees in mind when I write my articles, the good ones and the bad ones (and a few ugly), and it helps me know my audience. This is one of those times when it really does pay to work at the place and with the employees you're writing for. For certain topics, freelancing just wouldn't cut it.
Posted by Eileen | October 16, 2006 4:31 PM
Posted on October 16, 2006 16:31
DATE: 04/21/2005 19:44:4P PM
So true, Steve and Eileen. The corporate culture can be exhausting; I've sat through hours of meetings where all people talked about was who to blame for a problem. Ideas for fixing said problem never even came up.
And the one thing you never want to say in corporate America: "I'm too busy." People invariably hear that as "I'm busy and YOU'RE NOT." Took me about 20 times making that mistake before I learned my lesson.
Posted by Meredith | October 16, 2006 4:31 PM
Posted on October 16, 2006 16:31
DATE: 04/21/2005 21:35:5P PM
Steve, thanks for an incredibly insightful and candid piece here.
This is pretty much the singular reason I got out of consulting five years ago after a year during which I felt I was holding my breath, underwater.
I felt like I couldn't speak about what was happening in the organization without someone taking offense. And it wasn't that people were naturally defensive. It was that they seemed to feel that if they allowed the mere suggestion that they or any of their direct reports were in any way imperfect to go unchallenged, that others would feed on it and before they knew it, they'd be chewed up and spit out.
Steve--everybody--I'd be mighty damned curious to hear how you would have structured this meeting differently in order to keep these VPs from feeling this way.
Posted by David Murray | October 16, 2006 4:31 PM
Posted on October 16, 2006 16:31
DATE: 04/21/2005 29:42:0P PM
David:
Here's what I would have done differently. I structured the presentation like this:
First third: Selling the power of communication. Building a case for it. How it influences and affects the bottom line.
Second third: The situation at the company, and how the culture was in trouble.
Third third: The interactivity.
By talking about the importance of communication FIRST, and then describing the culture . . . I implied that the reason for the culture was the lack of communication. Maybe that was part of it, but it wasn't the only problem (big-time change, a merger, and other things played a big part, too).
If I had to do it again, I would strip the word communication right out of the damn thing.
By spending so much time selling communication BEFORE addressing their situation, the message was clear: You're not communicating. And of course most leaders think they are EXCELLENT communicators.
What I would do if I had to do it over:
1. Start with their culture, and all the reasons it is broken. Not talking about communication at all. Just list out focus-group results and other proof that the culture needs help and that employees are unhappy.
2. Go right into my ideas for how to fix it . . . and ask for their input. At that point, they would have said, "Well, we're doing this, this, that, and that."
And I could have built on what they WERE doing, and improved it, and focused it, and made sure they were addressing the right issues. It would have been much more productive.
Steve
Posted by Steve C. | October 16, 2006 4:31 PM
Posted on October 16, 2006 16:31
DATE: 04/21/2005 30:12:7P PM
In short, communication: The other c-word.
Thanks again for your thoughtful post.
Posted by David Murray | October 16, 2006 4:31 PM
Posted on October 16, 2006 16:31
DATE: 04/21/2005 39:54:4P PM
Steve,
I love that you are willing to expose a bad situation (especially since you were the somewhat unwitting culprit) and examine how to improve it and learn from it for the future. Would that we could write this candidly inside the corporations in which we work.
Have a dry martini for yourself and an appletini (ha!) for me and don't beat yourself up.
Sonya
Posted by Sonya | October 16, 2006 4:31 PM
Posted on October 16, 2006 16:31
DATE: 04/21/2005 49:15:5P PM
Sonya!! That's right!!!! Weren't you drinking appeltinis in the bar in DC?? Or was that Atlanta? Where the hell were we when we were drinking in the bar both nights of the seminar?
I make a lot of mistakes . . . but at least I do try to learn from them each time.
Steve
Posted by Steve C. | October 16, 2006 4:31 PM
Posted on October 16, 2006 16:31
DATE: 04/22/2005 02:45:4P PM
Thanks, Allan. You know, I never felt more like a rookie in my 15 years of communications experience . . . . not even when I WAS a rookie. Now I know.
Steve
Posted by Steve C. | October 16, 2006 4:31 PM
Posted on October 16, 2006 16:31
DATE: 04/26/2005 49:15:7P PM
Steve -
I'm a rookie in this field and have made several mistakes along these lines. I'm slowly learning how to be a more effective "communications program manager." And I'm discovering that doing so in the public sector is a far bigger battle than in the private sector.
Thank you for sharing your experiences with us. It's nice to know that even "communication gurus" like yourself can slip up from time to time. There's hope for us all!
Posted by Jenny | October 16, 2006 4:31 PM
Posted on October 16, 2006 16:31