Leave Blame Behind

"It wasn't my fault."

"I wasn't even there."

"I think it happened on the other shift."

"They are always messing things up."

Who's to blame? When things go wrong, when a customer gets angry, when a supplier raises prices, when things don't go as you planned. Who's to blame?

Will it even help if you could pin that down to one person? Will pouring guilt or punishment on a person solve your problem? Probably not.

But people do it all the time. It becomes part of the conversation before we even realize it.

Blaming others is so easy that many people don't even know they are doing it.

What if we stopped blaming others? What if instead, we worked together to find solutions, better ways of doing things, and ways to avoid what caused our problem to begin with?

It's OK to find constructive suggestions to offer to people who need it. But they need more. And problems need more in order to solve.

To arrive at our best possible outcome, we need to work together and attack the situation, not the person. How can we change the process, the procedure, the design, or the environment to make sure that we solve our problems and build more success? What exactly should we be doing to optimize our results?

The next time you catch yourself assigning blame (rightly or wrongly) what would it be like if instead you initiated a conversation about how to make things better?

-- Doug Smith

Comments

The Right People

Who do you get to help you solve your problem? You, of course, that's a given. Also, people who will be impacted by any solution you try. People who are feeling the effects of the problem right now. Even (especially) people who you think may be at the root cause of the problem. Get the benefit of many ideas. Enlist the help of people who will care how it turns out. Collaborate to gain commitment. Engage the right people in creating problem solutions so that they don't become the wrong people while implementing them. -- doug smith

Compassionate Patience

It's easy to forget how much work it took to get where you are. Skills that we can take for granted are still absent or being developed in other people, including our team members. Compassionate leaders remember what they were like before they acquired the skills they now wish their team members had. The challenge: staying patient. The good news: as a leader you can help those team members grow. -- doug smith

Love That Job

Do your team members love their jobs? Do you? There is nothing quite like loving a job you're doing. Focused, alive, attentive, building something important, serving people gladly...what could be better? We all need to work, why not love the work we do? As a leader, you are the main reason (yes I said the MAIN reason) your team members either love their jobs or they don't. It's all in the climate you create, the environment of both support and challenge balanced with precision and love. A leader who helps someone love their job is giving the world a wonderful treasure. What can you do today to show your team members the potential to make this the best team ever, with the best jobs ever? Here's one idea: appreciate. Thank someone, recognize some, share with someone how you value what they do and who they are. They'll like that, you'll like that...everybody wins. -- doug smith

Focused Truth

Focused leaders have zero time for inauthentic messages. They tell the truth unconditionally and insist on the truth consistently. Be a leader who can handle the truth. Be a leader who tells the truth. -- doug smith

The Positive Choice

Leadership carries many responsibilities. One of them is the responsibility to improve things. People, products, processes -- none of these are perfect. As leaders, we can help them get better or we can keep them right where they are. Given a choice why not allow things to get better? -- doug smith

It's Not The Volume

It's so tempting to get louder when your words aren't delivering the results that you want. I've done it. Raising the volume feels like action, it's more of a reaction. Emotions are so powerful that they can make us forget what we're thinking. Emotions are also contagious, and that extra volume invites a loud response. If you've ever been in an argument where you're shouting at each other, you know how ineffective that is. Saying something louder does not make it more true. Winning leaders manage their emotions. They check their thinking to see if it aligns with their goals. It could be easier to meet someone halfway than to pull them all the way to your way of thinking. That doesn't mean we need to compromise every time -- but we do need to show that we're willing to consider someone else's point of view. And then, that we do understand that point of view. Louder is seldom better. (Unless you're playing guitar, then loud could be good...) -...

Better Results

We do get to choose. It's as easy to be positive as it is to be negative and the results are much more pleasing. What's your choice? -- doug smith

Temporary

It would be easy to get upset about it, but not helpful. It's better to see the truth and then deal with it. It's all a work in progress. "Done" is only temporary. -- doug smith

Likability

Think about the most likable person you know. It's probably someone who makes you smile, who cheers you up, who says positive things during an otherwise tough day. The most likable person you know is friendly. They treat people with kindness. They do their job without complaining, completely and competently. They clean up after themselves and sometimes even for other people without being asked. The most likable person around just seems to make everything better. Could that be you? You're the most likable person you know if that's what you decide to be. Try it for a day -- you might like it. -- doug smith

Develop a Range of Skills

As leaders our development is never done. There is always more to learn, more to master. It's possible to get the "people part" of leadership right and still fail as a leader. Strategy, critical-thinking, planning, and problem solving are still critical. What have you learned today? -- doug smith

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