This is where accountability experts truly shine. They see themselves as facilitators, enablers, and supporters, not armed guards or cheerleaders. This self-image may go further in separating the best from the rest than does any skill they actually possess. Skilled individuals take pride in helping others make things easy. It’s part of their Golden Rule. It’s what they do.
Less skilled and more controlling folks have a different view of their role. They get people to do whatever it takes at whatever the cost and then brag about their leadership prowess. For them, making other people’s burdens less burdensome is a sign of weakness. The home version of this attitude isn’t any more attractive — for instance, getting your spouse to open up about a sensitive issue by piling on a truckload of guilt and manipulation. Why would anyone ever want to do such a thing? Because it’s a power trip and some people love power more than they love relationships or even results.
Believing that it’s praiseworthy to be able to compel people to complete tasks that are painful paints an intriguing yet counterintuitive picture of leadership. After all, human beings are forever finding ways to avoid pain and seek pleasure, not the other way around.
Distasteful tasks may be good for people at some level, and it’s true that employees are generally getting paid to do them; but if they’re normal human beings, they’re going to try to find a way to get out of dreadful jobs or at least make them easier. Don’t most of us use automatic garage door openers, punch TV remote-control buttons, and open cans with a special gadget of some kind? We don’t need any of these things, but they make life easier.
It’s important to make this distinction between necessity and convenience because we must be comfortable with the idea that it’s okay for people to want to find an easier, more convenient way to do a job.
Desiring to get out of hard and noxious work doesn’t reflect a character flaw; it’s what smart people do.
When your 12-year-old son goes to great pains to invent an automatic back scratcher or cons his friends into pushing him around the mall in a wheelchair, you can view him as either lazy or creative. And when someone who works for you runs into an ability barrier where the job is difficult but not impossible, you can apply your motivation tools to inspire him to keep his nose to the grindstone. Or you can find a way to make the task easier. Or you can do both.
For the remainder of this chapter, we’re going to look at how to make it easy for others. We already know how to motivate. And we’re going to take pride in the fact that we’re making it easy. It’s the smart thing to do.
Jointly Explore Barriers
Knowing what to do with an ability barrier is actually fairly simple: jointly explore the underlying ability blocks and remove them. That’s easy. In contrast, knowing how to remove those barriers requires our attention. That means we need to know if others can’t do something because of personal (they don’t have the skills or knowledge), social (friends, family, or coworkers are withholding information or material), or structural (the world around them is structured poorly) factors. But before we consider the ability side of our Six-Source Model, we’ll have to break years of bad habits.
Avoid Quick Advice
When we hear that someone faces an ability barrier, we habitually jump in with suggestions. We don’t even think about it. We’re experienced, and we understand how things work, and so when we see an ability challenge, we roll up our sleeves and fix things. It’s positively Pavlovian. We see a problem, and bing, the gate is up and our tongues are off and running.
When people come to you and explain that they’re at their wits’ end, it’s nearly guaranteed that you’re going to tell them what to do. After all, they’re asking you to tell them what to do. Nevertheless, jumping in with your answers isn’t always the smart move.
Should You Do It Yourself?
Let’s see how this problem plays itself out. A child brings you a broken toy, and you fix it, or at least you try. After all, the child either doesn’t know what to do or doesn’t have the skills or tools to do it, and so it’s obvious that you need to do the work. It’s the helpful thing to do. Or is it?
Resourceful people realize that when others face an ability block, you can either tell them outright what to do (if you know) or invite them to help come up with a solution: “What do you think it’ll take to fix this?” “Would you like to help me?” Savvy folks choose to work jointly through ability blocks. They fight their natural tendency to jump in with an answer and instead involve the other person. Here’s why.
Involvement Both Enables and Motivates
Enables
If you involve others in solving problems, two important things happen. First, you get to hear their ideas. People may not know exactly what to do, but they probably have a good idea about what doesn’t work. Actually, they may know exactly what to do but need materials or permission to do it. In any case, start ability discussions with a simple question: “You’ve been working on the problem. What do you think needs to be done?” Ask them for their ideas. Invite them to put their theories, thoughts, and feelings on the table. They’ll start to identify the barriers source by source.
When people aren’t completely certain about what to do or if it becomes clear that they don’t understand the situation fully, it’s perfectly legitimate to chime in with what you think might help. Of course, how you toss in ideas makes a big difference. Style counts. The feeling of the conversation should be one of partnering. You’re working together as intellectual equals, both of you throwing in your thoughts.
Motivates
There’s an important secondary benefit to involving others. When people are included in coming up with a potential solution, they’re more likely to be motivated to implement it, and that’s important. Consider the following formula:
Effectiveness = accuracy × commitment
Most problems have multiple solutions. The effectiveness of a solution depends on the accuracy of the chosen tactic. That’s obvious. It’s equally important that the person implementing the tactic believe in it. That’s where commitment comes into play.
A solution that is tactically inferior, but has the full commitment of those who implement it, may be more effective than one that is tactically superior but is resisted by those who have to make it work.
Let’s be clear about what we’re proposing. Many people argue that the reason for involving others is to trick them into thinking the ideas are their own so that they’ll work harder to implement them. We’re not suggesting that you manipulate people into thinking that your ideas are theirs. Involving others is not a cheap trick. We’re simply proposing that other people do have ideas, that getting them out in the open is to everyone’s advantage, and that when people are involved in the entire thought process, they see why things need to be done a certain way and are motivated to do it that way.
By involving others, you empower them. You provide them with both the means and the motive to overcome problems.
Start by Asking for Ideas
Involving people is better than merely telling people. But how should you do that? This is quite simple.