Could Your Troublemakers Be The Answers To Your Problems?
The “halo effect” is a wonderful thing. “Give a dog a bad name and hang him.” the
proverb goes. How often do management
(with the compliance of a cowardly and compliant HR department) label someone
as a “problem” because they usually:
Have a better idea?
- Disagree with what “the boss” says?
- Point out the faults in the organisation’s processes, systems and procedures?
- Seem to be constantly swimming against the tide of “received corporate wisdom”?
Labeling someone as a “troublemaker” – and telling them
about it – is an easy way to put them in their place. After all, most people want to be thought of
as “good corporate employees” and “team workers”. These are values that society and organisations
drum into us from day one. “Don’t rock
the boat”, “Don’t stick your neck out”, “Don’t make waves” tend to be the
oft-repeated phrases in appraisals, water-cooler conversations and the
like.
As a result, leadership becomes complacent, stops learning
and even over-invests in the status quo.
They may let themselves off too often or too easily when things go wrong.
How do “troublemakers” benefit an organisation? I see a number of ways:
Challenge:
Challenge and striving are good for us both mentally and
physically. They’re also good for our
customers, staff and shareholders. Look
at what happened to any number of large organisations that ultimately failed
because of the “hubris” of their leaders (Lehman Bros, RBS, Northern
Rock). No one dared to challenge their
force of personality, and the results were disastrous.
Learning:
A troublemaker might actually be pointing out a learning
experience; something new that’s happening in the market or internally. If you miss out on the opportunity, your
business could suffer.
Improvement:
They may be showing the way to do things better. Just because it’s “not invented here” doesn’t
mean that it shouldn’t be taken seriously.
We see too many examples of businesses that became complacent and lost
out (Microsoft, Nokia). The world is
amore competitive place, and businesses need to be able to spot trends and
react fast.
Foresight:
Different people process information in different ways. Some can spot trends or patterns faster than
others. Although what they say may not
be welcome as it will “cost too much” to implement and “none of the competitors
are doing it”, it doesn’t mean it isn’t valid.
If you constantly wait until the competition does it, you’re already
playing “catch-up” as opposed to “changing the game” and making others follow.
Some people may indeed be genuine troublemakers if all they
do is cause disruption, dissension and demotivation, but before dismissing them
out of hand, check to see if there’s substance to what they’re doing or saying.
One way of seeing if they have a point is to allow them
their head. Of course this is “risky”,
but if you establish clear guidelines on what you expect, their limits of
authority, key project review points, results expected and consequences for
non-achievement, you can minimise this.
Equally, you will then find out if you have a valuable but maligned
resource on your hands or a true “problem child” who needs help.
Labels: Career, Productivity, Strategy, Teamwork
posted by William Martin @ 09:52
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home