Topics—Leadership
Listening
Listening saves big dollars.
In a well-developed company culture, where people care about each other, it is safe to listening and to speak up. In this workplace, accurate information flows freely, so more people make better decisions. This is why listening and profitability go hand-in-hand.
Here Are Three Examples of Expensive Non-Listening.
1. A senior executive called a meeting with forty high-level managers to identify problems and opportunities to improve productivity. Afterwards, the senior executive proudly listed all the problems the group identified and the cost savings they projected. Based on this “information” he announced a major multi-year initiative.
After the meeting one attending manager told me, "Most of those problems aren't real, but he wouldn't let us leave the room unless we listed them, and the imagined cost savings. So we did."
This manager told me that his real problems were the interference of upper managers, and the poor working relationships with other divisions. But the senior executive refused to consider people-related issues. By limiting the conversation to emotionally safe, non-people, operational topics, he had created a farce.
2. In my book, Developing Your Company Culture, I describe a Fortune 100 CEO who refused to hear that actions by the executive committee prevented better coordination and cooperation between divisions, costing the company tens of millions of dollars annually. No matter how serious this problem, no matter how many managers raised it, and no matter how hard I tried, he would not and could not hear—and the problem remained.
3. A client, with a unionized plant, decided to improve relationships using the “The Cultural Interview”. To kick it off, the manager and I held an early morning pre-shift meeting with the union members and their Business Agent. The manager described the interviews as, "Getting to know each other better, improving relationships, and understanding issues we should all look at".
One Teamster turned to his Business Agent and said, "Hey! We could use something like this in the union." The Business Agent squelched that with, "This is a company program, not something we do!" The member's initiative was dampened by the leader's defensive (fearful) response. What a lost opportunity!
Lack of listening by senior managers is an all too common corporate problem. It is deeply rooted in the culture. Here are three areas:
The Power Box
James M. Citrin is a high-profile head hunter who just co-wrote a new book, The 5 Patterns of Extraordinary Careers, "based on a survey of 1.2 million managers." When asked, “Why do so many successful people self-destruct?” he replied, “I believe the higher people go, the harder it is to get truly unvarnished feedback. When you are the boss, people treat you differently.” (Fortune, July,21, 2003, p. 40). For thousands of years, leaders have struggled with this issue. Caesar and Napoleon wrote about it. As children we heard the story of "The Emperor With No Clothes." If you are high up, isolated in the power box, you just have to work harder at listening.Unbalanced Promotions
Corporations often promote “Type A”, narrow task-oriented executives—General Patton is a good example—who by definition do not listen well. The tops of many companies are overloaded with these people. Companies avoid this if they pay closer attention to the promotional process, selecting more balanced managers.
A Culture of Fear
In a work climate of fear, lack of openness and trust, and poor relationships, the supervisor or executive cannot receive honest feedback to make good decisions. In an autocratic workplace, feedback is minimal and distorted. In a well-developed company culture, feedback is timely and accurate.
In a recent informal survey, employees gave these reasons why they don’t speak up at work:
- Management doesn’t care, 27%
- There isn’t a good time or way to do it, 27%
- Fear of being labeled a troublemaker, 13%
- Fear of being punished for ideas, 5%.
Meet with your team. Brainstorm ways to eliminate these reasons from your workplace. Do it. The results will put cash in the bank.
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