Just Tell Us
When I was a child and got to a “certain” age, my parents
would give me a new rule or remind me of an old one. If it did not make sense
or if it was something I didn’t like I would invariably ask why? Asking why is
sort of a rite of passage for children to the point where it’s a cliché. There
were six children in my family so I am sure my parents didn’t want to give us
to in-depth of a reason or that is how they would occupy their time
exclusively. I don’t remember being a
problem child but remember sometimes reaching a point where if things didn’t
make sense I would get frustrated. That is when I would ask why.
I remember my father replying to my request for a reason by
stating, “Because I said so.” I can remember the compounding frustration I felt
when I wasn’t receiving a satisfactory answer. These days, I am not sure how
parents answer this question from their children. I have never done this to
mine because I remember how angry it would make me.
Midway through my career, I was having a discussion with
direct manager, with whom I had a good relationship, about an account and I ask
him why we were handling a situation in the manner that we were. I asked him in
a respectful manner. I didn’t want him to think I was questioning his judgment
or authority. I was very surprised when he jumped out of his chair, red-faced,
and yelled, “Because I said so!” I didn’t know who to be embarrassed for more
him or me.
In the corporate world, “because I said so,” is a phrase one
will rarely hear. However, in the realm of internal communications, companies
many times expect new innovations, policy changes, and rules, in general, to be
accepted without explanation of the purpose. In the Harvard Business Review
article, “Don’t Just Tell Employees Organizational Changes are Coming, Explain
Why,” Morgan Galbraith states, “Executives and those responsible for leading change cannot assume that
employees understand the reasoning behind them. You must spend time explaining
the changes and why they are important (HBR 2018).” Many times
the answer may be about saving revenue, it could be about staying ahead of
technology changes and potential issues “down the line,” if we don’t take care
of this innovation now. It’s ok, just tell us.
Many times
the diffusion of innovation and the reasons for the change seem to come down
from the top to mid-management then stops. The change is directed to staff
members but the reasoning why is never mentioned. I’ve brought this up to mid-level
and upper management when surveys prompted a response on job satisfaction. I
have also talked to human resource professionals about this and received a
tepid response. It was as if they had never heard this question before. As
Galbraith says if executives and I will add front-line management don’t
disseminate the information employees won’t understand the reasons and most
likely won’t be on board with it. Information
on the innovation is as important as the change itself.
Supervisors
and managers are responsible for this. Phil Robinowitz states, “If supervision is seen -- and
practiced -- as supportive and helpful, a way to continually enhance the
quality of one's work, then internal communication is more likely to flourish.
Another role that supervision plays here is that it can help staff and volunteers
to examine and improve their own communication, and thus improve communication
within the organization.” (Community Toolbox Blog 2010).” In other words, it is the management’s
responsibility to set the tone for the flow of communications. Staff members learn
to be good communicators by the example that is set for them by management.
Even if changes will be painful
for a while, it is important, to be honest about this and again, why these
changes are being made must be part of the discussion.
Something I
would add is don’t assume you know how the change will affect your team unless
you understand the processes of how things are actually done. This reminds me
of a recent meeting where a leadership group was explaining a major change in
the way we would affect the sales process to our system. Upper management
thought that one of the supposed benefits of the change was going to be that we
would save time processing sales orders. They believed that there would be one
less process when in fact it added a redundancy they never knew would be the
case. This occurred because those that
were involved with the task of order entry were never asked how they would be
affected by the change. In addition, they were never told why the change was
being made.
In other words,
don’t sugar-coat and make up reasons why we will love these changes, we won’t.
Just tell us what it is and tell us why and we will accept it. Maybe grudgingly
but we will keep moving forward with respect for those giving us the
information.
In his Forbes
article, “Eight Steps for Helping Your Employees Accept Change,” Brent Gleeson
writes about the importance of transparency when change is coming. “Everyone wants to know the purpose behind the organizational change.
In my last company, we decided that we needed a better project management
solution and better data as to where people were spending their time. This
would lead to improved financial decisions and efficiencies. So we rolled
out new software and a time-tracking tool. Holy hell! Let’s just say that this
threw everyone for a loop. It became very apparent that we needed to be doing a
better job explaining the “why.” Once the team understood the reasoning behind
this change and that the goal was to improve their work balance, the revolt
slowly subsided (Forbes 2016).”
I wish readers of this blog could watch me dropping
the microphone for Mr. Gleeson.
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