4 Hidden Traps of Team Dynamics

[00:00:20] Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of the Can You Hear Me podcast. I'm Eileen Rochford, CEO of the marketing and strategy firm The Harbinger Group. And I'm Rob Johnson, president of Rob Johnson Communications. Today we are talking about your team. Chances are that team is becoming more diverse from generational background and life experience perspectives. When those factors intersect, how can you make sure you're getting the most out of them?

[00:00:45] Today we're discussing the hidden traps of team dynamics and a recent article for the Harvard Business Review, Four Hidden Traps of Team Dynamics. They highlight those four challenges coupled with six solutions for them. You know how we feel about HBR as a professional resource. We comment on all the time on this program. And the article comes from a recently published book, All the Difference, Six Leadership Actions to Bridge Perspectives, Strengthen Teams and Create Value. So there's a little background.

[00:01:14] I personally read all the difference. So I'm really excited to have this conversation. Awesome book. Yep. I'm very excited about this. We're going to dive into what sounds like a super meaty subject, but we're going to kind of boil it down and share our own overlay of what we think about all this.

[00:01:30] The four landmine, sorry, that derail leaders. We're going to start our discussion with certainty. And that means being certain that your perspective is the correct one and differing points of view are incorrect. Now, certainty probably creates a lot of issues inside teams. Wouldn't you think, Rob?

[00:01:50] I think there's no question about that. And I know that we're giving people lots of information and I'm not trying to bring it back to the over-communicate book that I wrote, but this is right about chapter four. It's sort of about the illusion we're communicating when we're not. And it relates, I think, you're communicating something, but you're not communicating something that you thought you were. And you didn't take into consideration other people's points of view.

[00:02:18] Definitely. Another point that I think is connected, also talked about somewhat in your book, but in lots of other places too, is self-awareness. Don't you think that certainty, if you really, really, really dig in often and you find yourself walking into conversations or in the midst of maybe a little bit of a feisty debate and your feeling is with an unequivocal certainty that I'm right,

[00:02:47] that often is just a sign that you're lacking in self-reflection, self-awareness, which then leads to closed-mindedness. Don't you think? Well, absolutely. And the important part of that is self-awareness. I mean, you know how I feel about self-awareness and I know how you do as well. And if you're an executive that doesn't have self-awareness, just think about all the opportunities that you're missing.

[00:03:11] And the one thing I really liked about the article that we're referencing here today from HBR is that when they're talking about certainty, they say, you know, certainty, it feels efficient because it creates clarity, right? But what it's also saying is because you as the idea generator perhaps are so certain that this is the direction or the way the conversation should unfold, you're closing off other conversations that are going to really perhaps generate breakthrough ideas.

[00:03:39] So you're saying, I know this is the right way to go. This is the way we should do it. And other people are like, well, I had a different idea. And you may never hear those ideas. And that is the problem with certainty. Correct. There's one other point. It's not really a point, but I just want to say, I'm going to guess that most of us think we are self-aware. We reflect. We're not that person who's walking into these conversations dug in and wholly vested in our own certainty. That's not me.

[00:04:07] Well, McKinsey did a survey. And this was in a courts leadership newsletter very recently. McKinsey did a huge survey. This was of like 10,000 leaders who are in higher level management positions. And it found that very few spent meaningful time examining whether their own assumptions are truly right.

[00:04:30] And just food for thought. So that's 10,000 people, hardly any of them spend any time in that self-reflection zone. Now that yields self-awareness. And we've referenced this several times too. How many times do you hear an executive say, well, I ask questions, but I already know the answers to them. It's like, not if you're asking the right ones. And that means you're closing off a potential avenue for idea generation. And that is a shame. 100%. 100%.

[00:04:58] So the next one that we want to talk about here is inconsistency. So that is the divide between what leaders say and what they do, especially so it's when things are fine. That's great. When things are a little bit dicier, when you're under pressure, that's when it really shows up. So inconsistency is one of the other landmines that everybody should be watching out for. Definitely. What does inconsistency look like in your experience, Rob? When you see it, what's happening?

[00:05:27] Well, the thing that I just said, it starts with that. It starts with, you know, do as I say, not as I do. Or I say, we're going to do X, Y, and Z, but we're doing A, B, and Z. So that to me is, okay, here's our plan. But then when you see it in action, it doesn't look anything like the words that came out of somebody's mouth. That inconsistency is, it can derail a project immediately. And to me, that's what it looks like.

[00:05:55] And everybody thinks, well, we talked about it in the meeting. We left the meeting with action items. This is what we said we're going to do. And then they do something wholly different. To me, that's how it's manifested itself. That's when it's the most obvious. And I think that's when it's very damaging.

[00:06:09] I agree. I tend to see it when, in this whole point, this happens especially when people are under pressure, leaders and everyone else. What I tend to see is processes that are inherent to how an organization works. That things like we use a project management system, everything, nothing exists if it isn't within our project management system. Asana essentially is what we use.

[00:06:32] Some people use Monday. There's several versions out there. And within our project management system, there are templates for every single type of project that we undertake. And that is engineered specifically to yield consistency and not just efficiency. Of course it does. But it's really about consistency because we know through proven methods, the right steps to take to get the best outcome for clients.

[00:06:59] Well, guess what? I see when there's pressure. When there's a huge influx of deadlines on top of what we had been forecasting for and staffing for, what will happen, and I do this too, is we'll give ourselves an excuse and take a shortcut to those templates approaches and basically all the steps within our processes that make sure balls don't get dropped.

[00:07:25] And all the things that a template process approach helps support in quality falls away because we're making excuses. I'm too pressured. I don't have enough time in this day.

[00:07:38] But when I have, that was happening. And when I've gotten to a place of self-reflection and realizing I set the tone, I can't do that. I have to live within the project management system, no matter whether I'm traveling, don't have access to a computer, fewer hours in my day, whatever it is, I still have to do it always. No question. And when I put that switch in my own brain, the whole rest of my team stopped doing it too.

[00:08:01] Well, you just made an excellent point because in the article, it says, inconsistency is so dangerous because employees pay far more attention to what leaders do than what they say. So if you say, here's our project management system in Asana, here's the template for how we do projects so we have uniformity, which makes perfect sense.

[00:08:20] And then all of a sudden under pressure, somebody on your team or you might revert back to something that is comfortable for you, even though it may not be part of the prescribed project management system. That's where the trouble lies because you think about, well, I have certain habits and some habits are good and maybe some of them aren't good. But the reason you have it right there is because you want to have the Harbinger Group have a general consistency in the way that you deliver, the way that you conduct and deliver your work. Correct?

[00:08:49] Yes, absolutely. Yeah. Leader sets the tone for sure. That's what that's about. It's also about leader saying, we're all in a tough situation right now, but the last thing we should do is deviate from our norms in any process related way because that's actually going to lead to much bigger problems. So double down on the process.

[00:09:08] Okay. Then the third landmine, that one is called emotional reactivity. Basically, the reality that people respond differently and sometimes very intensely to certain events. And what are the dangers of allowing emotional reactivity to come into your team? What do you think, Rob? What have you seen?

[00:09:31] Well, I think emotion is natural. So you're not going to get rid of emotion entirely. And you want to have people that have that sort of empathy that exhibit those traits. But I will also say that getting overly emotional about anything in business is always a red flag, in my opinion.

[00:09:49] And so I really try to measure that understanding that people are going to react differently to the exact same situation or interpersonal interaction. So I respect that. But I also try to say, all right, self-awareness, put yourself in their shoes, you know, that sort of thing. And I try not to react emotionally.

[00:10:08] The other thing too is if people react emotionally to something in your office, I'm always the one that would like to tamp it down a little bit because I think being calm and level-headed is probably the right way to approach it. And I had a situation yesterday where there was a moment of disrespect from an outside party with one of my clients and everybody get really emotional about it.

[00:10:33] And I was not pleased the way what was done or said. And I tried to go around and calm everybody down and try to, you know, let me hear your side. What happened? Tell me what's going on. And just try to, you know, show care, show respect and not make it more emotional than it already was because the emotional component to it got out of control. And did that happen really fast?

[00:10:56] Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. I started getting texts and I'm like, and I wasn't even around for any of this interaction. And I was like, well, that's unacceptable. And people were very emotional about it. And I'm not saying they shouldn't have been. If I'd been in that situation, I might've been the same way. But it was my, I felt like it was my role to sort of try to not take the emotion out of it, but try to address it and acknowledge it in a way that was calming, that was respectful, that showed care.

[00:11:24] And it is your role to diffuse situations like that for sure. And it's often really hard to be able, I guess, to diffuse when you weren't present to hear exactly what happened. Right. That adds a whole, you know, additional level of complexity to the situation. You know, it's, and it can escalate quickly, as you know. Yeah. So what would you say about this whole emotional reactivity thing? Because I'm sure, you know, it's something you have to deal with on a regular basis as well.

[00:11:52] So it's easily the hardest thing that I deal with and have dealt with in my entire career, always for me. Because I tend to be a pretty like passionate, I mean, not emotional, but I feel like I feel deeply, I take things really seriously. And I, that's, those are good qualities, particularly, you know, commitment to quality of work, you know, doing, doing good by our clients.

[00:12:16] When, when I get emotional is when I feel like we haven't been given all the information maybe, or people I work with, whether clients or otherwise had all the information they needed to be able to follow through on something that was important and it didn't happen. And that reflects poorly on us and impacts, you know, the value of the outcomes that we generate, things like that.

[00:12:40] And learning to just gather facts first, examine, evaluate, consider, and then map a plan forward. I mean, it took me years and years and years to get decent at doing that. Yeah. So, you know, I empathize with everybody who's listening, you know, has similar challenges, but it's obviously worth the time and effort because no one wants to hire a hothead.

[00:13:08] That's, that's the bottom line for me. The situation I was referring to a second ago, it's still in process, which is, I told people I would run it up the flagpole with the appropriate authorities. I also let, we were also very busy with the task at hand that day. So there was not time to discuss it till hours later, which I also thought was good because it let everybody cool down because people were pretty hot about it. So they got to cool down and I was able to go around and say, tell me what happened from your perspective.

[00:13:38] Tell me what happened. Tell me what happened. And then somebody would say something and I'd say, you can't do that. Yeah. Yeah. It's tough. Being kind. I was being kind to them. We talk about that nice versus kind. I was being kind. You've developed a relationship with somebody enough where you can say, you can't do that. And so anyway, this, this has not been resolved yet by this airing. It will be, but at the current time it hasn't. And so it's, it's a work in progress. Yeah. Well, best of luck with that. I hope it all works out. Thank you.

[00:14:08] The, oh my gosh, we only have one more. We do. And then we have, but then we have some of the solutions too. So we got, we got a few things. Okay, let's go. Okay. So the final one. Oh yeah. The final one. I'm sorry. That that's justification. That's spending time defending your position rather than examining it critically. So you're so busy justifying what you did. You didn't take the time to say, was that really the best thing? And, and how does that manifest itself with you? Yeah.

[00:14:36] And it's so closely tied to a certainty. Don't you think? Like, it is, it is. They're almost the same thing. I feel like. Yeah. Yeah. Justification versus exploration can be such a waste of time and energy in my opinion.

[00:14:53] So rather than, than, than dig in and just entrenched position, listening for possibilities of other options that are presented, other perspectives that are examined off. It always yields a better, you know, final decision, final product, final outcome in nearly every situation. And sometimes just that process of listening to all of the other options in and of itself, it can end up being the justification for your position.

[00:15:23] But you have to let it play through, you know, there's, everyone is going to reject your thinking if you consistently double down and find every possible way to justify the option that you walked in the door wanting to implement. That becomes a winning, a singular individual winning mentality. And that is the antithesis of a team.

[00:15:46] So just think about how negatively that impacts all of the culture that you're, you know, trying to create and, and just the dynamics, the positivity dynamics that you need on your team or, you know, sustained success. That's a great point that you made. And I love what they put at the very end of this part in the article. Justification transforms moments of potential growth into cycles of defensiveness. It turns curiosity into certainty, certainty and accountability into blame.

[00:16:14] So you sit there, somebody asks you a question or you're explaining a decision you made and you get defensive because you want to be right or whatever, whatever your reason is, as opposed to opening up the possibility that there are other points of view out there that might be equally as good or things that you should at the very least explore. Yeah, consider. If you're going to die on that proverbial hill, man, it's going to be, you're going to be alone. It's going to be a lonely one. Yes, it is. Almost every time. Yep.

[00:16:43] Because the ideas, new ideas are like at a minimum, they're built to your own idea potentially. So just think of it that way. Instead of being the opposite or hurdles that stand in your way, they could be, you can turn them into built. So that's a good mindset to have. Absolutely. All right. Before we wrap up this awesome discussion, we're going to leave you guys with some actionable items, some solutions, if you will, to the various issues that were raised in this HBR article.

[00:17:12] And in this case, the authors have six ways to diffuse those landmines. Know yourself, self-reflection, self-awareness, like we talked about. Know yourself and the exercises to doing so. We have a bunch of those. So we'll include some in the show notes for sure. The next solution is to return to respect. That's awesome. When you remind yourself, I... There has to be respect. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:17:38] A huge part of everyone's job in the workplace is to behave respectfully, foster respect for others, and just modeling that way of thinking and behaving is crucial to every team. The third one is to activate honesty. I love that. And honesty, that plays into the whole nice versus kind point of view too.

[00:18:02] Being, utilizing honesty to achieve the greater good, not to sugarcoat things as crucially important on every team. You got to keep honesty present because if you don't have honesty, you can't have trust. That's absolutely true. And we all know... And your team will never go anywhere. It'll be just stuck in neutral. Trust is the bedrock of everything, particularly communications, which communication is what makes teams run. Let's be real. Yep. Yeah. See the whole story.

[00:18:31] Don't look at it from a singular perspective, I think, in other words, is what they're getting at. So seek to understand comprehensively what happened, not only your point of view or one point of view that was presented to you. Go get them all. Figure out the whole story. Ignite togetherness, which again, you can't have an effective team if you don't have a shared bond of togetherness. So remember that no matter what the challenges that you're facing, you're going to do a better job together as a team every single time.

[00:19:01] And there are two more. Commit to action, which is crucial. Whenever we're in a struggle space, what's the thing that makes us feel best? It's action. Figure out the next best step. Let's do something. Let's figure it out. Yeah. What is that next best step that's going to get you to a better place, even if it's a tiny one? But carve out some two, three things that you can do in terms of immediate actions and everybody will feel better. So always remember that. And then turn differences into action.

[00:19:31] This is also a really interesting perspective, but we can't dive into all. Rob, what were your favorites from the list? I would say, well, because we mentioned it multiple times now, I'm not even going to count it, but self-awareness. Boom. That should just be a layup. There it is. But the other ones on this list, and they're all good. Don't get me wrong. I would say return to respect because in a respectful environment and on a respectful team, everybody feels valued.

[00:20:00] They feel like their voice, even if you don't act on somebody's idea, they know their ideas are heard and there is a general respect. And the teams that have that respect get a lot more done than those who are working in silos, as you mentioned earlier. Those who feel like my voice isn't heard, they feel stifled. So that's an important one, the return to respect, and then turning differences into action. The way I read that is I'm a solution-based person. So anybody can come up to me and say, oh, here's a problem. Here's a problem.

[00:20:30] And then you might have to look at the problem and say, well, how did that happen? Why did that happen? How do we make sure it doesn't happen again? I want to come up with solutions. So those differences that you might have with somebody or bad news or whatever the case is, turn those differences into action. Be a solution-based person, as opposed to here are all the reasons that we can't get it done because we don't agree on X, Y, or Z, or we're not aligned on a specific issue. So for me, those are probably the two most important things on here. What do you say about that?

[00:20:59] Well, I'll just build on your last mention of turning differences into action, which I totally love. It's such a rallying cry for everybody because everyone can do that. I recently read, it was a piece on LinkedIn, and I loved it because it talked about the word intrapreneur that they had, air quotes, invented.

[00:21:21] And the concept is that people inside of organizations, everyone can be an intrapreneur, which is essentially a problem solver who identifies opportunities and takes action. So intrapreneur, everybody. I love that. I love that. I think that's outstanding, and I'm glad that you were able to define it, and that makes perfect sense. Because if you're sitting there and you're part of a team and you work at a corporation, you're like, where do I fit in? And if you think about it in those terms, all of a sudden you realize, hey, I can't have some impact here. That's empowering. Yep.

[00:21:51] Everybody can. Yep. It's genuinely a mindset, and it's about finding the tools. I want the self-awareness point that you raised, the tools that I'm using right now because I really want to be self-aware more so. I think I've been working on it for years and years, but I've mentioned this before on the show. It's a big thing that I've been paying a lot of attention to. And one way that I'm doing this, I'm not sure that I've mentioned this before, but if I have, I apologize, listeners.

[00:22:19] It's the asking specific questions. So everybody asks clients or colleagues, people you manage, so tell me how you feel, what's going on? Vague questions when it comes to sharing observations and things. It happens all the time, and to me, it's just so futile. So I've been researching and looking up different tools for asking specific questions, and I've been trying questions like, how do I hold you back?

[00:22:48] Or how have we as an agency held you back from doing something that could have led you to a higher plane? Tell me more about that. What do you learn? Oh, my God, so much. Well, you revise things five or six times. And if you could be more thoughtful and really settle on what you want, this is me, Eileen, sooner than I could create a better product.

[00:23:14] And we could get where we need to go and meet the deadlines, things like that. Like, okay, yeah, I definitely have that perfectionist tendency. This is some feedback I got a year or two ago, and I've definitely been working on that. I ask questions like, what should I stop doing? And we ask clients, what should we stop doing? And one of the things we learned recently was, you guys are doing great. You know us really well. We don't need to have meetings every single week.

[00:23:39] We need insights from you weekly in an actionable form and to keep us on the rails. But honestly, once or twice a month for deep dive, status, feedback, information gathering type longer form meetings, that's all we need. Which was awesome because that freed up tons of time for us to do other things. And all clients are different because I'm sure if they said, we want to stay on this meeting cadence, you would be like, we're going to do it. But all clients are different and they respond differently to the information that you're sharing with them. So that's a good note.

[00:24:09] Yeah. So the lesson here is work on some more specific pointed questions that are not going to result in a yes or no response. Well, and I can relate to that because back in July at the Executives Club book talk for Overcommunicate, when you're interviewing me, you're like, do you want to see the questions in advance? I'm like, no. And you were asking very specific questions. So you're already putting this into practice. This is real. I can confirm that. Yes.

[00:24:37] Getting better at asking pointed questions that result in excellent feedback. It's working. It's working. Thanks. Okay. Work in progress. All right. So that covers it for the topic today. We thank you all for listening. I'm Eileen Rochford. And if you would like to comment on our Can You Hear Me podcast, maybe even suggest a topic, you can contact us through a number of ways. We've got the LinkedIn page for our podcast.

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[00:25:31] It helps other listeners find the podcast. And we do thank you for listening. Okay, guys. Take care. Take care.