317. Stop Blaming Your Team for This

0:00So I was on a coaching call recently and with a group of owners and I was like, I want you guys to think about a person on your team who isn't delivering predictably, reliably and consistently. And I don't want you to think about like your obvious employer like, oh my god, like they don't do anything. No, I want you to think about a person who you really are invested in, right? You're like, how do I coach her? What should I say to her or them, right? Maybe they need more support. Maybe I wasn't clear enough. Maybe I need to train them again. Maybe I need to have a different conversation. The person who else already taken you on four rounds around the teacup ride, right? I call it the teacup ride because you coach, you explain, you remind, you accommodate, you coach again, woo, around the teacup ride. And then you do it again, right? They change their behavior a little bit. They make some incremental prior racks. They give you some crumbs and you're like, oh, this is great. Like it's moving. And then you coach again, you explain again, and you remind

1:02again, and you accommodate again. Well, next round around the teacup ride. And somehow you're still rendering and you're like, why can't they do this predictably, reliably and consistently? Right? Everyone has like run through some version of this, right? And so the thing that most owners get stuck in is what happens when they don't do it, right? Because most frameworks and processes and systems and SOPs and checklists, right? Are just like when they don't do it, they're like, well, did you coach her? Did you train her? Did you tell her clear enough to do this? Did you do this? Did you do this? Right? Everything is about, well, you know, is the culture safe enough to make mistakes? Well, you know, are they, do they have space to be their authentic selves? Well, you know, what about this? And everything becomes the owner's problem. And this can't be normal. It cannot be normal that every single part of where an employee is failing is the owner's

2:03responsibility. It isn't. It is a two person relational dynamic, which means both of you participate in creating this outcome. Okay, the outcome being that this outcome still isn't being done. Okay, because when I ask owners, like, what do you actually do when someone misses the standard or doesn't do what they're supposed to do? Right? I don't, it's not about, well, in our handbook, I don't care what your handbook says. Okay? Or like, well, a good leader, I don't care what a good leader is supposed to do. I want to know what you actually do. And then the answer is come pouring in, right? What people actually do is I remind them. I talk to them again. I do it for them. I try to understand them. I understand it was difficult. It was flu season. The license or came three kids called out, two teachers were out. She just had a baby. This person was sick. I give them grace. I realigned them to the standard. I adjust the role. There was an owner on the call and she kind of declared out loud. She's like, yeah, it's just like a really sophisticated way

3:07of nagging. And I'm like, and then another owner was like, I run through a rotation of things. Right? Like, I remind, I talk, I understand, I this, I that like, I run through a rotation. Again, teacup ride. Woo, woo, keeps went around. Right? There isn't I say teacup ride, by the way, is because like, I have a strong disliking to well, really any kind of amusement park rides. I don't go on roller coasters. I've never been on a roller coaster. I have no desire to ever go on a roller coaster. But I have been on the teacup ride, you know, a few times with my kids when we used to go to like Hershey Park or like, you know, these just little amusement parks are things like that near New York City where we lived. And anytime I go on the teacup ride, I'm like, oh, it's such like a cute kid's ride. Like, it's so innocent. Like, you know, I'll be okay, right? And like, I get on the teacup ride. And I am so nauseous at the end of the teacup ride, right? It just goes like, round and round. And I'm like, oh my god, get me off this ride. So I feel like accountability conversations are very much like the teacup ride. You just go round and round and round and do

4:07the same thing and you spin and you spin and you turn and then you get off and you feel like you want to fall off your face and you have a case of vertigo that like no medication can even mute and you are so nauseous. And then your kid is like, can we do it again? Right? And you're like, are you kidding me? But we like willingly enter the teacup ride every single day with every single one of our employees, right? And what many leaders call accountability, right? We have like a cocktail of responses. Like sometimes I remind you, sometimes I coach you, sometimes I understand you, sometimes I extend the scent deadline, sometimes I do it myself, sometimes I get angry, sometimes nothing happens. Eventually I become too resentful and then I have a big giant conversation with you about how this can continue. And then you change a little bit and you know, and then I try again and then maybe I bring in HR and then maybe I do a write up and then I probably reach a breaking point. And then I'm like, okay, it's time for me to fire you, but I can't really fire you because I'm short-step. So I got to go on the teacup ride again. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. So the employee experiences it as what exactly is the system here? Because there isn't one. There's you. There's you.

5:15Right? And this is something I say to every single leader. If nothing changes when the standard is missed, you don't actually know whether the person can't meet it or whether they have learned through your behavior that they really don't have to. I'm going to say it again because I really want you to sit with this distinction. Okay? If nothing changes when the standard is missed, you don't actually know whether the person can do the standard or meet the standard or whether they've learned through your behavior that they don't have to. Right? Because leaders will tell me, well, they don't have capacity. Well, they're overwhelmed. Well, they're short stuff. Well, it's really hard for them. How do you know? If every time she reaches the edge of her capacity, you supply your capacity, you don't actually know if she could do it or not. If she doesn't remember and you remind her, then you don't know if she actually could remember.

6:17If she doesn't anticipate and you anticipate for her, then you don't know if she can build the anticipation muscle. If she never closes the loop and you close the loop for her, if you always jump in because the outcome matters too much to let it fail, then you never learn because what actually is happening, you supply capacity that belongs to the role. So the role requires x, y, and z. You decided that the person can't because they might be disappointed, frustrated or overwhelmed. And so now you supply your capacity to the role. That doesn't come without a cost. That does not come without a cost because you're trying to assess whether she has capacity while also making sure she never has to fully encounter the requirement to build that capacity in the first place, which is an impossible diagnostic. So I watch this happen with an owner on a call that I had. Right? So in our school leadership, we work with owners and directors and we install

7:21infrastructure inside of their organizations. And so this owner will call her, we'll call her Gen. And she had someone on her team that she'd been struggling with for a while. And she, she had already communicated the standard, right? She was really explicit. The standard was there. The person knew what the rhythms of return were like, what they have to do predictably. There was reporting. There was a dashboard. There was a spreadsheet. There was a KPI. There was rocks. There was all of the things fill in and it was all there. Okay? But the outcome still wasn't being produced predictably, reliably and consistently. So at that point, she doesn't need another conversation. I said, you're at the point where you have enough evidence to actually know, is this a skill gap or a willingness gap? I don't know which one it is. Right? You have to go ask

8:22that to that person. You have to go to that person and say, we have given you everything. You know the standard. You know you own this. You have room on your calendar. We have trained you. And you're still not producing the outcome. So I need you to tell me, is this a skill gap? And if it is, you need to go learn that skill because we are company can no longer train on this. Like we've trained on this and you're still not able to do it. So I don't know if it's a skill gap or it's you're not actually executing the skill or is this a willingness gap? Are you unwilling to do this because it's uncomfortable? It's hard for you and it's whatever. I don't know. Fill in the blank. It's a completely different conversation because of the person says it's a skill gap. Do you want to learn it? Do you want to build this capacity? If it's willingness, it's completely different. You cannot supply willingness in another person. You cannot. You cannot supply

9:26willingness and capacity in another human. And this is why owners join the teacup ride because you can supply reminders and strategies and coaching in another chance. You can supply enough of yourself so that the organization convulutes its own functioning around someone else's unwillingness. Because you give so much of yourself that the company looks like it's functioning and it looks really successful, but it's successful because it's being supplied by your cognition and visible labor and capacity. You cannot make another adult want to build capacity. I write about this in my book this can't be normal. You cannot hug an adult into accountability. The reason why we continue on the teacup ride of accountability conversations is because it gives you something. It preserves possibility. You get to stay in the world of possibility. Maybe I haven't explained it correctly enough yet. Maybe I need to coach her differently. Maybe once the school year starts. Maybe once

10:34the staffing settles down. Maybe next month. Maybe if I give her another tool. There's always another conversation available. But infrastructure produces evidence. Infrastructure isn't only there to make your organization run smoothly. Infrastructure invites you to encounter reality. Without it, you don't know if someone's failing because the standard is vague. Or ownership is unclear. So yes, you want to create the standard, the ownership and the rhythm. And if you want help with installing infrastructure, we do that inside of our HQ. And we have content about that on our substack. You could click the link in the show notes. But eventually there becomes a point where support has been given. Everything has been given. And it's still not happening. And owners still turn the failures on themselves. There's one brilliant leadership move that I just haven't figured out yet.

11:35There's a magical tool. There's a magical conversation. There's magical pixie dust that I haven't reached yet. But when I get it, oh, she's going to finally be accountable. I had a conversation with an owner and she's like, I need her to know it in her bones. Because when she knows it in her bones, then she'll do it. And I said, no, people can know things in their bone and still be unwilling to act on it. Infrastructure does what it's designed to do. It gives you evidence of reality. And reality is devastatingly painful because it tells you that someone that you really like and care about and has been loyal to the company. And you've written the wildest storms with. Still cannot reliably produce what this role requires. Nobody has to become the villain for that to be true. This is another false binary that many owners find themselves in where it's like, either I'm right or she's right. Why? You both could be right. The business needs X.

12:41The person can reliably produce Y. I care about you. I understand your life circumstances. I believe you're a phenomenal human being. And X is still required. That's an entirely different model of how we operate. Because it moves you away from saying, how do I finally get this person to do it? And now you ask, what does the infrastructure tell me is true about the reality of what this person can predictably and reliably and consistently produce? And that's a very painful place to sit in because you no longer get the protection of they're going to get there. They're going to get there. I got to supply a little bit more of my capacity. I got to give a little bit more of myself. I got to extract a little bit more. They're almost there. They're almost there. But they're not almost there. Because it's five years later or it's one year later or it's six months later. Like, why does it

13:42have to be five years later to reach a breaking point? Why do you even have to reach a breaking point? Why is a good leader someone who just empties the tank and completely extracts and depletes and they are dying on the vine? And then it's like, wow, I really did everything. And now I can be morally justified in saying you're not a fit. We literally destroy our bodies and our minds and our relationships and our parenting and our marriages and our friendships. On the altar of I need to give them another chance. I need to give them another chance. I said, this isn't there. I need to give them one more chance. What if you don't? What if you create a predictable response? Here's what I do the first time someone breaks the standard. Here's what I do the second time. Right? Not, I'll see what I feel like. No, no, no, this is what I do. Because if you have to

14:44negotiate how you respond when someone breaks the standard in real time, when you're feeling disappointed, frustrated, scared, overwhelmed, tired, and stretched, then your response is not going to be the response that you want. Because then it's mood. It's based on how you feel in that moment, which means the business runs on your capacity and your mood. That's not a business. So I'd love to invite you deeper into this conversation. I actually wrote a whole article called, there's no magical accountability conversation. And I write about more of this stuff on my substack. On this can't be normal. What to do in success starts to feel like survival. You could click the link in the show notes. You could subscribe for free. It's a conversation and a place where we go deep together. You get to think alongside me. I get to think alongside you. I write about this. I ask different questions. This is not a place of tips and tricks or hacks. This is a place to learn how to witness yourself and experience yourself inside of your leadership and how you can really

15:48encounter. This is how I'm participating in this. And then you get to make your own discerning choices about what you want to do next. Remember, you have your own agency. You're really intelligent. You're really smart. You know what to do. But you keep negotiating with yourself. And that's what this conversation is about. It's like, why do you negotiate with yourself? How do you learn how to stop negotiating with yourself? How do you stop negotiating the needs of the business because someone else is uncomfortable? Those are different questions. Those are different conversations and spreadsheets don't answer them. So I'd love to invite you into that conversation. Thanks for joining me.