Make them visible. Play the role of ignorant outsider. Keep asking, “Why can’t we do that?” If a policy is no longer relevant, find a way to do away with it. If a rule is excessively constraining, secure permission to release the constraint. Every time someone passes a new company rule, you can bet it’s in response to someone making a bad choice. Now everyone is restricted from ever making a choice:
“Listen up, folks. Roberta broke the law yesterday, so we’ll all be going to jail.”
Keep in mind that rules and policies don’t solve everything and that the ones you make in-house you can unmake.
If you really want to help people identify hidden barriers, attack the paperwork. Look at forms and signatures as targets for change. If people can’t complete their jobs on time because it takes seven signatures to get started, revisit why the signatures are required.
One company cut its response time in half by reviewing such a policy. The typical customer-service response couldn’t begin until seven people signed off on a form. This was the liberating idea: Typically, three of the people needed to give approval, but the other four only needed to be informed. Allowing employees to act after three signatures and then routing the form to the other four after the fact rocked their world.
By all means give people easy access to the information they need to make the right choices. Make sure that from the mass of data that’s out there, the right data are in front of the right people at the right time. For example, quit complaining that your daughter isn’t following her diabetes regimen if she’s cut off from the data (her various blood sugar levels and the consequences of each one) that would encourage her to do the right thing. You can harangue. You can beg. Or you can put numbers and charts in front of her.
Here’s another helpful tool. To help surface all sources of influence, ask, “If you ran this place, what would you do to solve this problem?” Asking people to assume the role of the big boss can be extremely liberating. Freed from the shackles of thinking from within their own fields of influence, they begin to look for ways to remove every company-made barrier.
In short, think hidden forces, think lots of forces, and keep at it until you’re satisfied that you’ve wrestled every single barrier to the ground.
As you finish an accountability discussion, there’s a danger that despite your efforts to surface all the causes behind an ability problem, you still have unfinished business. The person still might not be motivated. How could that happen? This typically occurs when you describe a problem and the person immediately identifies an ability barrier. People tend to point to an ability block because it’s less threatening — even when they may also have conflicting priorities.
That brings us to our point. The fact that people start by identifying an ability block doesn’t guarantee that once it’s removed, they’ll actually want to do what they’ve promised to do. Once you’ve finished identifying and removing ability barriers, check both sides of the model. Ask, “If I get the work-up to you by two o’clock, are you willing to do what it takes to finish the job by five, or is there something else I need to know?”
Checking both sides means that you end a discussion of ability by checking for motivation. Of course, it goes both ways. If a person starts with “Do you really want me to do that? It’s such a pain,” and you spend time explaining the natural consequences until he or she agrees to comply, there’s a chance the person may also be facing an ability barrier or two. Once the person has agreed to comply, check the other side. Check for ability problems: “It sounds like you’re willing to do this, but is there anything standing in your way? Is there anything else we need to deal with, or can I count on you having this to me by Tuesday at nine?”
Once you’ve dealt with motivation, check ability. If you start with ability, check motivation. Remember to check both sides.
Make It Safe for Others to Search
Let’s end our discussion of ability problems by considering a difficult case. You want to brainstorm root causes with another person but don’t have the authority to do so.
For instance, your boss promises to give you a hand with customers during peak hours, but he’s routinely unavailable when you need him. Are you really going to have to motivate your boss to live up to his promise? Is that what’s going on? One thing is certain: you want to get to the root cause. Does he dislike helping out because he doesn’t like working with hostile customers? Does he think the work is beneath him? Are other priorities more important? Has he forgotten how to do the job?
You don’t know what’s actually going on here. Your only goal is to talk to your boss, identify the real forces behind his not helping, and learn if he’s going to keep his commitment or if you’re going to have to find a way to live without his help. That means you have to encourage your boss to join with you as you brainstorm reasons he isn’t keeping his commitment. Or if you’re in a real hurry, you could just step in front of a moving train.
Ask for Permission
We’ve talked about this before. If you lack the authority to require another person to discuss root causes, you can do so only by permission. So ask for it. If you do have the authority, ask for it anyway: “Since we agree on the problem, could we take a few minutes to talk about what’s in the way of solving it? I’d like to be as helpful as I can in making it easy to avoid the problem in the future. Would that be okay?”
Ask for Feedback
Perhaps the most gracious way to open the door to a complete discussion of underlying causes is to ask if you are adding to the problem. When you take responsibility for your contribution, you make it safe for other people to do the same thing: “My goal is to solve the problem. I’m particularly interested in learning about anything I might be doing to contribute to the challenges you face.”
Prime the Pump
People often feel unsafe discussing root causes because they fear that any analysis will make them look weak or selfish. If they’re not able, that’s bad. If they’re not motivated, that may look worse. You need to change this view. Your job in leading a root-cause discussion is to let others know that you see them as people of worth who are currently unable to do what’s expected. This isn’t about fixing their character; it’s about a fixing a problem.
One of the best ways to assure others that you’re not going to get angry when you learn the root cause is to “prime the pump,” or take your best guess at possible causes, without looking stressed, miffed, or judgmental. This helps others start the flow of information by making it safe for them to speak honestly. Priming works only if you take your best guess in a way that tells the other person that you’re okay with him or her admitting to what you just described. Word choice, body language, and tone of voice make a huge difference. Consider the following question: “Is that too hard for you?”
Now read the line in a patronizing way. Next, do it in anger. To draw on your real talents, read the line with sarcasm. Finally, try to be respectful. Imagine that this is a person you care about and genuinely want to help. How does that affect your delivery?
When priming is done well, it provides others with real-time visible evidence that you’re not going to demean or criticize them for honestly discussing the real issues. In short, your success depends on whether you see other people as human beings or villains. If you’ve come to see others as people you want to help succeed, most of the time you’ll do just fine.