CHAPTER 14

Build a Loyal Team of Problem Solvers

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“No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.”

–VOLTAIRE

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When something goes wrong, it’s often not the problem itself that’s so devastating, it’s what happens to an employee’s confidence. One of the best ways to support your employees is to help them recover from a bad “last time.”

• “The last time I gave someone feedback, he cried.”

• “The last time I was honest with my boss, I got a negative review.”

• “The last time I presented to senior management, I got so nervous I forgot what I was going to say.”

• “The last time I stayed up late working on a report, they didn’t even look at it.”

• “The last time I interviewed, it turned out the job had already been promised to someone else.”

The memory of last time can destroy this time before you even start. In this chapter, we offer specific ways to build, and rebuild, employees’ confidence so they get back to performing at their best.

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Even folks who are normally confident sometimes need some extra support.

During the last day of scuba certification, 60 feet below the surface of the crystal blue waters of the Caribbean island of Bonaire, Karin stopped breathing. Oh, air was flowing. But the pristine water suddenly turned dark and crushed her lungs.

Panicked, she signaled to Sven, her scuba instructor, “Up!” He looked confused. Then she signaled more aggressively, “I need to go up now!”

He checked her equipment, looked at her curiously, and gently signed, “No.”

Now more frantic, she kicked powerfully to swim up. He deflated her flotation equipment and held her down. Surfacing too soon would create medical problems. He calmly signaled that they would go up together, slowly.

Karin’s husband and son watched with amazement. Why was Mom, a former lifeguard, competitive swimmer, and triathlete, freaking out?

Sven knew that how he reacted to Karin’s panic mattered. He also knew that he couldn’t certify someone who might lose it diving in a remote area of the island. How he responded below and above the surface made all the difference.

Every now and then, the most important thing to do is jump in and take control. Even if that’s necessary, it’s never sufficient. Sven stayed calm and reassured Karin he was there for her and wasn’t going to let her drown. Many managers would have stopped there, or taken over, following up with a conversation about “job fit” once the emergency was over.

It’s what Sven did once they got back to the shore that showed his deeper understanding of leadership. After giving Karin the silence of the boat ride back to reflect, Sven gently asked lots of questions to understand the situation. Where had she started feeling uncomfortable? What did it feel like? Were there signs of nitrogen narcosis, an infrequent side effect that makes scuba divers act drunk? Surely such a reaction had an explanation. Before he could support her, he needed to know more.

Then he reassured her that she was still competent. “Karin, you’ve mastered all the skills and demonstrated them well. You know all the standby emergency procedures. You know what to do.”

Next he redefined the problem. “The biggest risk now is that you will be afraid of becoming afraid. You weren’t afraid to go deep before, so there’s no reason you should now, unless you tell yourself you’re going to be afraid.”

Sven continued where many managers stop short, with straight talk. “I know you can do this and want to certify you. If you panic again, I can’t.” There are consequences to low self-confidence. Sven understood that he couldn’t risk putting her in a situation where she could harm herself or others, but he didn’t just think it, he said it. Only after all of this straight talk did he end on a note of encouragement. “You’ve got this. Let’s go try it again.”

They did. The next dive led to certification. Certification led to a wonderful week of diving all over the island, including in remote areas. No fear, just fun.

HELP AN EMPLOYEE REBUILD CONFIDENCE

The difference between energized, productive employees who stay with the team and people who become listless and leave often comes down to confidence. Use the following techniques to help your people rebuild their confidence.

1. Acknowledge what’s real.

If last time really was a complete disaster, acknowledge the issue. When you say something “wasn’t that bad” but it was, you lose credibility. If they’re blowing it out of proportion, offer evidence to help them see the past from a different perspective. Remember, Winning Well managers speak the truth.

2. Break it down.

Ask questions to help them understand the root cause of what went wrong the last time. Chances are, not everything went wrong. It’s much easier to improve when you know what to fix.

3. Outline what’s different about the scene.

They may think they’ve seen this movie before, but the truth is, last time was different in many ways. Take the time to explore how today is different from yesterday, or this one’s different from that one.

4. Celebrate the learning.

Help them consider all they’ve learned from the last time. Ask, “What will you do differently this time?” (The wording of the questions presumes that they will try again and helps them realize they have learned something to do differently.)

5. Help them prepare an approach.

The best way to create a win this time is to help them fully prepare. Assist them with questions to nurture their ideas and to help create a strong strategy. To win well, you need your employees to remain confident in their abilities to succeed. Look around. Is there someone on your team who’s too panicked to breathe? What can you do to inspire their confidence?

BUILD A CULTURE THAT NURTURES PROBLEM SOLVING

Do you ever wish your people took more responsibility for problems, came up with ideas on their own, and solved problems without always involving you?

When people don’t solve problems, there’s a good chance the management culture is part of the problem. Some Pleaser and Gamer cultures punish innovation: New ideas have to fight through stifling layers of bureaucracy to be given a chance, or else the slightest “failures” are met with Users’ withering derision and criticism. In either case, you won’t see much innovation or creativity. It’s just not worth it for employees to try.

Even if your company is risk averse, you can create a Winning Well culture that breeds innovation and problem solving with just a few easy steps.

When the World Wide Web was just starting to be used at schools and libraries, David worked for an educational nonprofit and thought it would be fun to put together an outside-the-box research project that the teachers could use with their students.

However, the staff was not particularly computer savvy, and David had only been with the organization for a few months—not nearly enough time to build the relational capital to sell the idea within the company. Fortunately, David took the idea to Jim, the executive vice president, who said words every one of your fledgling problem solvers needs to hear: “Let’s try it.”

Jim guided David to provide a small demonstration and then make the project available for one or two adventurous teachers who were early adopters. From the first trial runs, David learned how to streamline the project and make it more user friendly. Several staff members took advantage of the project, and David had more credibility in the organization.

Many years later, Jim’s words came back to serve David and thousands of young people. During the Great Recession of 2008–2011, he led a nonprofit organization that served young people. You would think the recession might have been a difficult time to do nonprofit work—and you would be right. As happened to so many other contribution-dependent organizations, fund-raising revenue for David’s nonprofit contracted as the economy went into a tailspin.

However, during that same time, the nonprofit was able to almost double the number of clients it served. How did it manage that?

Well, it wasn’t because of some great idea David had.

Two years prior to the recession, one of his team leaders, Manuel, came to his office and said, “David, my team and I have an idea.”

He explained the idea to David. As David thought about it, he considered the lack of infrastructure to support the concept. Scaling the idea would require more staff training, investment in personnel, and resources. It was possible that pursuing the idea would be a distraction from core activities. However, it was very much aligned with their nonprofit’s mission, and it had the potential to serve many more young people in a way they needed.

What would you do?

It was then that Jim’s words came back to David. “Let’s try it!” he said. “Start small—just one location. See how it works.” Manuel and his team did just that. They learned some lessons from that one location. Then they rolled it out to several sites, where they learned even more about how to improve the program. Then, just as the recession began, they rolled it out across the organization.

Manuel and his team ended up expanding their ability to reach clients during one of the toughest economies in our lifetime.

To build a culture that nurtures innovation and problem solving, practice these steps:

1. Make it safe to try.

When someone brings you an idea that you’ve tried before, don’t send him away with a terse, “We tried that. It didn’t work.”

Try this invitation instead: “Thanks for thinking about this with us. We tried a similar idea last year and we found an issue with …. Would you be willing to think about that issue and see if you come up with any ways to make this idea work? I’d love to hear them.”

2. Start small.

The technology sector is well known for its minimum viable product practice. What is the smallest way you can test an idea and learn how to improve it? Get moving, get feedback, and get better.

3. Reward behavior, not just success.

This is important. When you ask people to solve problems, you are actually asking them to take a risk. Their solution might not work. How do you respond? Are you grateful they tried, or do you get upset at the failed effort?

To build a culture that nurtures innovation and problem solving, reward effort. Say thank you. Have a prize for good ideas that don’t work.

One of the most powerful questions you can ask a direct report is: “How can I help?” The first step is to ask the question. The next is to respond in a way that helps you not only win, but win well.

As a manager, you’re in a unique position to help your team in specific ways that no one else can. If you don’t ask how you can help, they may not tell you. This doesn’t mean you jump in and do their work for them, which might help you win today but wouldn’t build long-term competency and sustain results over time. What it does mean is that you:

1. Ensure that your employees have skills and equipment they need to be effective

2. Remove obstacles to success

3. Develop their abilities to take responsibility and problem solve

In our experience, managers struggle with the third one the most: developing their team’s ability to take responsibility and solve problems. When an employee struggles to find her own solutions, most managers respond in one of two ways: Users get upset while Pleasers dive in to “help” by offering solutions. Unfortunately, neither response gets you what you want: more time for your work and more responsibility from your team.

If you get upset, they will stop bothering you. They’ll also resent you and begin dragging their feet rather than solving problems that need attention. If you play the hero and jump in with answers, the immediate problem gets solved and work continues. But next time an issue comes up, your team still can’t figure it out for themselves, and, worse, you’ve now taught them that if things get difficult, you’ll just figure it out for them. They may like you and thank you, but they didn’t learn how to do it.

The help your team really needs is not for you to chastise them or solve problems for them. What they really need from you in these moments are your questions.

THE POWER OF HEALTHY QUESTIONS

Managers who win well ask good questions that free up their time by increasing their team’s ability to think and problem solve on their own. A good question or two can quickly move the conversation back to the employee owning the problem and analyzing potential solutions. But not all questions are good questions; some can make matters worse.

Poor questions look to place blame and dwell on failure, and they are followed by an implied, “You idiot!” Examples of poor questions are:

• Who screwed up?

• Why did you do that?

• What were you thinking?

In contrast, Winning Well questions focus on learning and on the future to generate ideas and solutions. For example:

• What is your goal?

• What did you try?

• What happened?

• What did you learn from what happened?

• What would you do next time?

Assuming that your staff members have the basic skills, training, and materials they need to do their jobs, this conversation doesn’t have to take more than a few minutes.

But what if someone replies to one of your questions with, “I don’t know”?

“I don’t know” can mean many things. Rarely does it mean the person has zero thoughts about the issue. More often, “I don’t know” translates to:

• “I’m uncertain.”

• “I don’t want to commit before I know where you stand.”

• “I haven’t thought about it yet.”

• “I don’t want to think about it.”

• “Will you please just tell me what to do?”

• “I’m scared about getting it wrong.”

When confronted with “I don’t know,” Winning Well managers continue the dialogue, easing the person through his anxiety and training his brain to engage. This is where the bonus question comes in. With one question you can reengage the person in the conversation and move through “I don’t know” to productivity.

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When someone says, “I don’t know,” ask: “What might you do if you did know?”

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When someone says, “I don’t know,” your bonus question is: “What might you do if you did know?”

It’s like magic.

In our experience, the person who was stymied two seconds earlier will start to share ideas, brainstorm solutions, and move on as if never stuck. It’s amazing and hard to believe until you try it.

The bonus question works because it addresses the source of the person’s “I don’t know.” If she was anxious or fearful, it takes the pressure off by creating a hypothetical situation: “If you did know, . . .” Now she doesn’t have to be certain or look for your approval, and she becomes free to share whatever she might have been thinking.

If she hadn’t thought about the issue or didn’t want to think about it, you’ve lowered the perceived amount of thought energy she must expend. You’re not asking for a thesis on the subject, just a conversational reply to, “What might you do … ?”

Our brains can do amazing work when we remove the emotional blocks. When you do this for your team, you train their brains to engage, to push through their ordinary blocks, and to increase their performance.

Ultimately, they will be able to have these conversations with themselves and will need to bring only the very serious issues to you.

You’ll know you’ve succeeded in asking healthy questions when a team member tells you, “I had a problem. I was going to come and talk it over with you, but then I thought, you’re just going to ask me all these questions. So I asked myself all the questions instead, and I figured it out.”

Those are foundational business coaching questions that can work in almost any situation. Of course, there are many other magical Winning Well questions. Here are a few to get you started:

Questions to Address Disengagement

• What is the one thing we could do to make it easier for you to do your job effectively?

• What can I do to help you be more effective in your job?

• What makes you proud—or not proud—to work here?

• What are the most and least engaging parts of your work?

Questions to Build Confidence in Solving a Problem

• What options are you considering right now?

• What do you think are the pros and cons?

• What do you think you should do?

• What is most puzzling or difficult about this?

• What have you done in the past in similar or analogous situations?

• What’s your biggest unanswered question about this situation?

• Who do you think has the right experience to help you with this?

Questions to Help the Overwhelmed

• What’s something that’s very hard for you to do but would really help you be more effective?

• How can I help you right now?

• What people or resources would be helpful to you right now?

Questions to Ask Before Launching a New Project

• Why is this project vital?

• Why are we doing this? Why now? Who will benefit, and what do they most need? How much will it cost, and why is it worth the investment?

• What does success look like? How will we measure our success? What are the process measures that will let us know we are on track?

• Who else must we include? Who do we need to be successful? Who are key stakeholders who should be brought in early?

• How will we communicate? Will we use any online collaboration tools? How frequently will we meet? Will we meet face to face, by telephone, or by video?

• How does this project integrate with other work under way? (In this phase, it’s worth going slow to go fast to ensure that there’s no redundancy or, worse, competing efforts.) What can we learn from others who’ve done similar work? (Again, it’s worth taking the time to benefit from other people’s learning. Breakthroughs are almost always improvements of work that has come before. Be sure you know what that is. Slowing down sets the stage for rapid acceleration down the line, once it’s clear who’s going to do what and how it fits into the bigger picture.)

• Who will do what, by when, and how will you know? (Too many project teams jump right into the action planning. Asking the previous questions first will help ensure that your plan is effective.)

Ask these questions and help your team ask them as well. You’ll soon find you’ve increased your team’s capacity for problem solving, freed up time to focus on your work, and unlocked leadership potential when you encourage employees who master critical thinking to help guide others through these questions. You’re not only winning, but Winning Well.

YOUR WINNING WELL ACTION PLAN