You Need More Clarity on Your Team - Here's How To Get It
We’re writing this month, as we often do, about leadership team cohesion. This week I specifically want to address the impact of clarity (or lack thereof) on the leadership team dynamic. In the interest of *ahem* being clear, I’m not talking about an intentional lack of clarity—lying, obfuscating, misleading. I’m talking about the lack of clarity that can arise even in the presence of kindness and friendship; that well-intentioned, “No, it’s fine” when it’s really not. The belief that you know each other so well, you know what the other person is thinking.
Here’s the simple (but not easy) conversation you need to have with your leadership team right now:
Team Analysis - who are we as a team? What are our strengths and weaknesses? How do we maximize our strengths and mitigate our weaknesses as a team? What are our core values as individuals? What are the core values of the company we’re building? How do those values drive the decisions we make and the way we behave day-to-day?
Common Goals - Are we crystal clear on what is most important? Is it revenue? Is it happy customers? Is it culture? (Hint: they can’t all be most important)
Common Agreements - What are some common expectations we all have for each other about how we show up at work? What is the impact if we operate outside of those expectations?
Processes - How do meetings work here? What’s on the agenda, how often do they happen, how long do they last? How do we communicate between meetings? Who needs to know what, and how do we make sure that happens? How do our meetings and communication ensure clarity? Who has the authority to make what decisions? What’s the process for making those decisions? Who gets input, who gets a vote, and who is just informed after the fact?
Establishing clarity on these things doesn’t mean your leadership team will never experience conflict, but it will give you a reference point to come back to when you disagree. It gives you a chance to say, “How are our actions helping us achieve our goals? How do they match what we agreed we would do?”
I’ve facilitated hundreds of these conversations with all sorts of teams: Learning Teams in MBA programs, senior leaders in Fortune 100 companies, and C-suite executives in scaling businesses. They all have their nuances, but here are my tips for having these conversations that apply to everyone:
You should codify your agreements, but it’s not about the document—it’s about the discussion and what you learn about one another in the process.
Your first pass at identifying values is probably going to be BS. You’ll choose some things that look good if customers were to read them, but they don’t show up in your lives. Keep pushing until you have 1-2 core values that give you a yes to the following questions: Does this define us? Is this who we are at our best? Is this a filter that we use to make hard decisions? For a great primer on how to have this conversation, refer to Brene Brown’s Dare to Lead.
Make it a living document. Set aside a distraction-free block of time to have the first conversation and start the document. Have someone “clean it up” and share it for the whole team to review, then get back together again after a week or so to discuss and finalize it. Then check it monthly for the first year, asking yourselves, “Are we acting within our agreements?” If the answer is no, determine whether the agreement is unrealistic or whether the team needs to work a little harder on building new habits. After the first year (and probably some re-writes), refer to it at least quarterly to stay on track.
I’ll leave you with a thought that Tom Nolan, CEO of Kendra Scott, recently shared with me.
“A cohesive leadership team is necessary for any organization because, at the end of the day, any company is only as good as its people. If leadership isn’t fully aligned and all moving in the same direction with their goals and objectives, then it’s difficult to maximize your success.”