chapter 3
How do you encourage everyone to share relevant information with each other?
- Increasing sharing of information
- Increasing sharing of wisdom
- Improving team learning
‘The more we share, the more we have.’
Leonard Nimoy
Self-assessment
Before reading the chapter, do the following quick self-assessment.
How would you rate the following in your team?
Competitors or colleagues?
Fernando and Carlos sat opposite each other. They were colleagues in a sales team. They worked independently and were both successful in their own regional areas. Their sales director, on the spur of the moment, had asked them to sit down and compare notes on their individual sales strategies.
Fernando sighed. ‘OK, let’s do this. We need to talk about our strategies, but I’m not sure what benefit that will give us, to be honest. We still have different regions that we’re responsible for and I’m not sure what I’m doing is applicable where you are – and vice versa.’ He looked at Carlos for agreement and as he didn’t get a response, he felt confident and hence continued his one-way dialogue. ‘Look, I know what I’m doing, I’ve been doing it for years. I don’t actually need any help, I am however prepared to share some of my extensive experience, if needed.’
Fernando wasn’t going to share anything more than what he absolutely needed to. Why should I? he thought. He had worked hard for his success and deep inside he was reluctant to just give that away to someone else, even if it was a colleague. In a way he felt hurt that his boss had even suggested this meeting. Besides, he didn’t really see Carlos as a colleague, they were all competitors in his mind.
Carlos had watched Fernando with great interest through his monologue.
I always thought he was arrogant. And here we are, being asked to collaborate, and I’m not sure I want to. I came into this with an open mind but it’s very obvious that he is not going to be forthcoming with his strategy, so I’ll probably hold back too. Why should I share if he is not going to? Carlos was irritated by the whole situation.
With some hesitation they started exploring their sales accounts, and it turned into a ‘look how great I am’ display. As they were going down the list of existing clients, Fernando spotted the name of a company that he knew also existed in his region. In his mind, he decided to add them to his list of prospects, but didn’t say anything to Carlos about it.
A month later Carlos was in a meeting with the customer in question. The customer was eager to speak:
‘We were contacted by one of your colleagues, I think his name was Fernando,’ he started.
Carlos tried not to look too surprised. He was suppressing his anger. His stomach started to churn.
‘He contacted one of our other regional head offices, to sell your portfolio. I wanted to let you know that we were a bit surprised by this, but then we don’t know how your company works. However, I’m sorry to say that we had to turn him down, because he just didn’t seem to understand our needs well enough. I only found out afterwards, otherwise I would have put in a good word for your company, but as it now stands, the business in that region was given to one of your competitors. I’m sorry.’
Carlos was speechless. Not only had they lost the business, but the customer’s perception of them had also been impacted. Carlos was furious. He was hit by an overwhelming sense of being let down. He was embarrassed. Carlos knew that he would have to pick up the phone and confront Fernando as soon as he left the meeting.
Exploring the problem
The two sales colleagues in the given example, are not collaborating, they are simply co-existing. And as a result, they miss out on a major sale, which affects both Fernando’s sales results as well as the organisation’s revenue.
Having team members who don’t freely share what they know, is a challenge that most teams face, not just a sales team such as this one. Sometimes people don’t make the link between lack of sharing and not getting as good a result as they could have. Let’s explore this example in more depth to see what was going on.
Sharing
Fernando doesn’t want to share what he knows. He’s not used to doing it and he doesn’t see any advantage in doing it. He feels like he has worked hard to get to where he is, and doesn’t think that he should hand that experience over to others. He thinks they should have to work as hard for it as he has done. And given that he views his colleagues as competitors, it becomes very obvious why he won’t give any information away. This mindset holds him back from any meaningful collaboration.
Fernando doesn’t feel like he has anything to learn. With a long career in sales, Fernando is confident that he knows everything he needs to know about selling. He’s not considering that Carlos could have other insights and knowledge, which he could benefit from. He feels superior to Carlos, but his behaviours are telling a different story.
Carlos won’t share because Fernando won’t share. Initially Carlos keeps an open mind to collaboration. But as Fernando is taking on a superior stance as well as showing his reluctance to sharing, Carlos withdraws from the opportunity of collaboration. He colludes with Fernando’s behaviour by thinking, ‘If you don’t tell me, I won’t tell you’. This almost child-like behaviour is played out time and time again in business.
Impact on productivity
By not having a meaningful and generous exchange of their sales strategies, Fernando and Carlos are less productive, as indicated by the loss of a sale.
In this example there is an obvious link between lack of sharing and the effect that has on the results. It’s not always as obvious as this, which is why the importance of sharing is sometimes overlooked in teams and in organisations as a whole. But if we ignore sharing, then the cost to the business could be much more dramatic than we realise. To understand how to overcome this challenge, we need to first be aware of why people may not be forthcoming with information.
The reasons for not sharing relevant information in teams
Believing that knowledge is power
This is a common misperception. With this belief people will withhold information as they expect it will make them weaker if they give information away. However, the opposite is true. There is the old-fashioned saying that ‘knowledge is power’ yet today we live in a world where information is so quickly out of date that we need to share simply to keep up to date. We therefore need to acknowledge that on some occasions knowledge is power, however dysfunctional that might be.
Lack of awareness
If there is no habit of sharing, people won’t share. They won’t be used to it so they won’t see it as important or even an option. They don’t know what they don’t know. They won’t see the benefits of sharing as they haven’t experienced it. If people are also busy, which many increasingly are, there will also not be any appetite for even taking the time out to try it and see what it could lead to.
Silo thinking
If people don’t understand how what they are doing fits into the bigger picture, they will not see a reason for sharing as they will only be narrowly focused on their own part. They may be used to working alone and not have had reason to consider how this could help them or others.
Not valuing your own knowledge
If you don’t value your own knowledge or opinion, you are less likely to think anyone else would either. This will mean you are not stepping forward to offer your contribution to a discussion or a collaborative situation.
Competitive thinking
If you see your colleagues as competitors, this will inevitably inhibit you from sharing. In a perceived competition, you compare yourself with others and will not share as it would give your ‘competitors’ an advantage they did not have before. It’s driven from win–lose thinking where you think there can only be one winner.
Another aspect of competitive thinking, is making any sharing conditional. It’s based on the underlying idea that you will only share something if you get something back. ‘If you don’t tell me, I won’t tell you.’
Yet another expression of competitive thinking is to want others to have to work as hard for it as you have had to.
Fear-driven behaviours
It can feel scary to share. You may feel as if you are giving away something very valuable, and you may be fearful of what that does to your position in the team. It may make you question if you will still be as valuable when your knowledge has been spread to others.
Feeling threatened, whether the threat is real or perceived, drives defensive or at least protective behaviours.
Protection
In some cases, information is withheld in order to protect others. The logic behind this is that people may not be able to handle the information or may be hurt by it.
The impact of not sharing information/knowledge in teams
When information, knowledge and experience is not shared, it limits the intellectual bank of the team. The team cannot perform as effectively.
This is how a team is impacted:
- Duplication of work happens when people don’t know what others are doing or how others could help through their knowledge. When information isn’t flowing freely, there is a risk of continuously ‘reinventing the wheel’. Someone could have solved the problem before but as their solutions are not readily shared, you end up doing the same thing again. Ultimately this creates a higher workload and makes people busier for no logical reason.
- There is less collaboration. People do their own thing, work in silos and are less likely to reach out to their colleagues. People are driven to work in silos.
- Learning is negatively impacted. When not sharing, you’re taking away the other person’s opportunity for learning and growth. The team’s growth is therefore also affected.
- Team spirit is eroded when you know someone knows something and he/she is not sharing it. This affects the trust levels.
- Retaliating behaviour such as ‘If you don’t tell me, I won’t tell you’ brings down the maturity level of teamwork.
- The team is not achieving as much as it could. The collective intelligence of the team is not fully utilised.
The impact on the business, customers, employees and stakeholders
The example at the beginning of this chapter shows the impact on the business overall when information is not actively shared.
As highlighted with regards to team, the organisation overall is also affected through everyone being busier than needed, with unnecessary work overload and stress increasing the risk of avoidable mistakes.
Let’s look at another example of business impact, this time with a focus on employees across the organisation.
Stella was cross about the latest reorganisation, which meant she now reported to Rajeev. Even though she respected him, they didn’t have the best working relationship as she always felt as if he wanted to take over in meetings. She found him controlling. With her specialist knowledge of the bank, her participation in meetings and projects was crucial. She found herself withdrawing from any situations where she knew Rajeev would be, in order to stop him from attempting to control her. Stella also didn’t want to give away too much of her expertise to him as she felt this would weaken her position. Stella had been with the bank for many years and Rajeev was relatively new. She quite liked having the upper hand and didn’t want him to know more than her, which he would if she shared her business secrets with him.
Over time, her non-productive behaviour was noticed by others. She was seen as difficult to work with and hard to get any information out of. She started to become a problem. Whenever they could, her peers excluded her from meetings. She was becoming the problem. There were hushed conversations in the corridor and they were talking behind her back, saying how it would be easier to leave her out because it was just too much hassle getting valuable information out of her.
As this short story exemplifies, non-sharing behaviours create a work-around culture. This kind of culture is not effective, it wastes time and people start feeling unsettled. Engagement levels go down as does commitment and loyalty, and eventually people could leave. This all equates to a higher cost of doing business.
Because of this lack of sharing, customers can get mixed or conflicting messages as employees are not talking enough with each other. In the example of Fernando and Carlos, the customer is confused about how Carlos’s company is operating. Their actions don’t seem to join up in the eyes of the customer and this creates some quiet concern. This leaves the customer with a possible question mark over the continued relationship.
In this case, we can all observe the impact in the story. The question to ask yourself is this though: How many of these situations occur without you even being aware of them?
Solutions
Getting people to share information, knowledge, and experience is a crucial business opportunity not to be missed. What you are actually getting access to is wisdom.
Knowledge + Experience + Knowing what to do with it = Wisdom
‘It is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.’
Henry David Thoreau
When there’s a healthy flow of communication, you are creating a learning culture, where contributions multiply to the benefit of individual, team and organisations.
Let’s get specific on how to do it.
Solution 1: It starts with you!
If you want others to share what they know, maybe even having worked hard to get to know, take the first step and role model the kind of sharing you want to see. Fearlessly share what you know, what you’ve experienced, what you’ve learned. Then ask people to do the same. Actions speak louder than words. Believe with conviction that it will make a difference, as people will sense your conviction and that impacts your results positively.
Solution 2: Make people aware of the effect
To convince anyone that it’s worthwhile to open up and be generous, you need to explain why. Find examples of what happened when people did share and when people didn’t. Give people feedback in the moment, real time, when this is happening. Tell them what you’ve observed and what impact it has on you, the team and the organisation. Suggest what to do next.
This TOP (Team, Organisation, Person) feedback model shows the process of effective feedback. This model demonstrates that you can give feedback by taking the observed behaviour and talking about the impact on the team, the organisation and you personally. Ensuring that you remain focused on the behavioural aspects.
Figure 3.1 The TOP feedback model
To use this TOP feedback model in the team, follow these steps:
- Think about the person’s behaviour that you have observed.
- Then think about the IMPACT those behaviours have on the team, the organisation and finally on you personally, with a specific focus on how it makes you feel.
- Prepare your suggestion for what they could do going forward (this can of course be positively reinforcing a strength as well as something to do differently).
- Then give the feedback to the person and listen to their thoughts on the subject.
If we use the example with Stella it may sound like this:
Stella, what I really like about you is the wealth of experience you have on the bank, the business and the organisation, and when you DO share your experience I like your style of being open and honest.
It has an impact on the team because we have access to you and you can really help us with the challenges we face. You know all the relevant people and who to go to for what. I would like to see you share more of it with us.
Your experience is a great asset to the organisation. For me personally, I am happy with your knowledge and I really would like you to volunteer that information rather than me having to ask for it.
It would be good if you could share more and get involved more with the team.
Solution 3: Create and run ‘sharing PODS’
Make it easy for people to share by creating specific sessions for this purpose. Create and run specific ‘sharing PODS’ where the participants are facilitated through a process of giving knowledge/experience input on a given subject. PODS sessions could be run for small and informal as well as big, more formal and complex purposes.
Power
Of
Dynamic
Sharing
Examples of this could include PODS sessions on how to retain customers or talent. Participants would be invited to come prepared to share examples of what has worked and what hasn’t worked from their experience.
Solution 4: Link to the big picture
Take a look at the big picture with your team. Identify where you fit in the overall picture of the organisation. Start by considering the following questions:
- How does the work you do contribute to the purpose of the organisation?
- Who is dependent on your work?
- Who are you dependent upon to be able to deliver?
Understanding where your team fits in the success chain, needs to be part of your culture. This kind of ongoing discussion creates a heightened level of social awareness and makes people look up and look around them.
Solution 5: Celebrate successes of when it’s worked and delivered results
Make the case for generous, fearless sharing by noticing when it happens and recognising people for doing it. Give individuals credit for their generosity and celebrate the results it leads to. Be specific and point to cause and effect, e.g. ‘This person took time to update you all on what he had learnt in a process improvement workshop, and as a result we have all become more aware of process improvement opportunities and have managed to cut the verification process time in half. This has affected client satisfaction as well as allowing us to take on more clients, and increasing revenue.’
Force yourself as a team to stop and celebrate success.
Solution 6: Dare to share
Sharing doesn’t always come easy. It can feel scary, but as Susan Jeffers so clearly stated in her book with the same name: ‘Feel the Fear – and do it anyway’.4 Sometimes you just have to be brave and step out of your comfort zone to make new things happen.
Let’s have a look at what Fernando and Carlos could have done instead, had they deployed these solutions.
Fernando and Carlos sat opposite each other. Their sales director, on the spur of the moment, had asked them to sit down and compare notes on their individual sales strategies.
Fernando looked at Carlos and confessed. ‘OK, I have to admit that I was a bit hesitant about this. I’m not sure what benefit it will give us, but I’m willing to give it a shot. In a way, we’ve almost worked as competitors for all these years, competing for the sales champion titles.’ Fernando smiled wryly. ‘Actually, when I put it that way, it sounds a bit crazy what we’ve been doing, we ARE colleagues after all.’ He paused and then continued: ‘What do you think?’ He looked inquiringly at Carlos.
Carlos had watched Fernando with great interest through his monologue.
Hmm. This is turning out more interesting than I would have thought. Fernando is more open-minded than I would have previously given him credit for. I came into this with an open mind and it looks like he did too. Interesting, this might create all sorts of new opportunities. Carlos was beginning to feel more optimistic.
‘I agree,’ Carlos responded. ‘I know we all have our own tricks of the trade and we’ve always kept them to ourselves. But maybe he is right, maybe we can achieve more by sharing those tricks. I’m happy to give it a go. It’s not like we are really competing with each other after all. But it’s a very different way of thinking, that’s for sure!’ Carlos scratched his head with bemusement.
With some hesitation they started exploring their sales accounts, and as they were going down the list of Carlos’ existing clients, Fernando spotted the name of a company that he knew also existed in his region. He turned to Carlos and said, ‘Wow, look at that. I didn’t know you had them. I have been considering contacting them for my region. What do I need to know about them? What can you tell me about them?’
A month later Carlos was in a meeting with the customer in question. The customer was eager to speak: ‘We were contacted by one of your colleagues, I think his name was Fernando,’ he started.
‘He contacted one of our other regional head offices, to sell your portfolio. And apparently he did a great job at it, because your company now also has that region. This together with the fact that I have long since sung your praises, has now made our CEO want to discuss signing a national contract. If the price is right, of course. Who do I talk to about that?’ Carlos couldn’t stop the smile from spreading across his face.
Behaviours of team and leader
Under ‘Solution’ above, we have listed a number of ‘how to’ actions. These solutions work best when carried out with these supporting ‘how to’ behaviours. The actions on their own will get you only so far. With the right behaviours you will get team members to share more effectively.
Thoughts and feelings of team and leader
On average, a person experiences around 70.000 thoughts per day.1
Many of those thoughts are habits that affect a person’s mindset or outlook.
What we think affects how we feel, and how we feel affects how we think.
When wanting to share information within a team, actively replace thoughts and feelings that are counterproductive to that. Here are thoughts from the story and some additional ones, their impact on feelings and how they can be changed.
Summary
Teams are made up of individuals who all bring their unique set of skills, knowledge, experience and wisdom to the table.
Fearlessly share
Effective teams are those who regularly, generously and fearlessly share what they know for the benefit of everyone. In order for this to happen, there needs to be a good level of trust.
Powerful sharing
An effective way of building trust is to kick off some powerful sharing, starting small and building it up. Then actively and explicitly explain the links to why the sharing made a difference and where. It could be as simple as a debrief meeting or discussion after a meeting, simply saying ‘let’s share what worked here and what didn’t work’. Take the first step and start sharing more than you did yesterday and just watch the results.
Reflection questions for the reader
Look at your team and consider:
- How much sharing goes on in the team?
- Do people hold on to specialist knowledge?
- How could we create more opportunities for formal and informal sharing?
- How am I a role model for information sharing?
- How much success are we celebrating?
Self-assessment
After you have implemented the solutions in this chapter, answer these questions again to see the progress you have made.
How would you rate the following in your team?
