A manager was frustrated with the inconsistent performance of some of his people. He would talk to them, and it would get better for a while, then they would slide back. It made him mad. I asked if there could be something contributing to their inconsistencies coming from up the line.
Light bulb moment.
It hadn’t occurred to him. No one had suggested another source of the problem. He thought they would have said something if that were the case. But, had he asked open-ended questions? Had he talked with them, when he was not annoyed, about what could be causing problems? Nope. Guess what he committed to do that week.
Sometimes we make assumptions about people and their performance without knowing the whole story.
“We need to stop just pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they’re falling in.” Desmond Tutu
