Bringing Deming to the Office: Drive Out Fear
This post is the second in a series of three by Phil Hawkins in which he looks at the work of Dr. W. Edwards Deming. In the first, Bringing the Factory to the Office: Applying Deming, he discussed the concepts of quality, process, and people. In this piece Phil moves on to the domain of personal communication.
As I look through Deming's 14 points for management, I see items that are generally not reflected in descriptions - or implementations - of his work.
And where common business practices come into play, one of the most infrequently incorporated points is Number 8:
“Drive out fear, so that everyone may work effectively for the company.”
How did it get there?
Fear is generally caused in the following way:
People hear or see something - or hear about it - and they interpret what they see or hear as a reason to be fearful. They will draw a conclusion, correctly or incorrectly.
The problem is that the fear is real even if the conclusion is inaccurate.
Fear of what?
So what are these fears?
Being fired, missing a pay raise, these are obvious.
Having to work overtime. Being thought less of if you leave early to pick up your kids. Having to move to another city. The dreaded public speaking assignment. Or just a feeling that you cannot complete the task. The list is endless.
And there is no real way of knowing what it is that a person is afraid of or why he or she is afraid.
Sometimes the individuals themselves are unaware of the source of their unease.
To top it off, there is always the nagging thought that you, as their manager, might have inadvertently caused the fear.
Talk
The only way to discover these fears and put them to rest? Talk to people.
It isn't always easy. Managers get no training in this whatsoever. Generally, managers need a coach or a facilitator to keep things on an even keel when they start out on this path. And I don't mean the kind of facilitator who has an agenda and a watch. I mean a facilitator who can spot potentially difficult areas and guide the conversation though them. If you set out to talk to people with the aim of discovering and resolving people's fears, you need to be prepared to hear about your part in the whole business.
Listen
If we can't yet get to the source of these fears, what can we do to counteract them?
People want to contribute, and they want to know that their contribution is appreciated; they need to know they are a part of the team. The easiest way to have people feel part of the team is to listen to them. Believe it or not, the biggest influence in people feeling part of an operation is if they feel that they are listened to.
This is fairly simple, but not as easy as it sounds.
To truly listen you will need to get rid of some of your own inhibitions and prejudices - as you surely have them.
That's not to say this is a bad thing, everybody has them, and often you are completely unaware of them. These impediments to listening can come from as far back as your kindergarten, your family, your neighbourhood - the list, once again, is endless.
Acknowledge
To cut a long story short, the only way you can find out if you were truly listening is to ask the speaker.
Only if the speaker acknowledges that he or she feels that you listened to them can you know that you heard what they were saying.
Often I have heard interactions in which one person said to another “I heard you”, yet somehow it didn't seem to appease the speaker. The speaker clearly did not feel listened to. You can try it yourself - when you feel someone was not listening to you, think about how it feels. There is actually a sensation in your body. To ensure communication, especially as a manager, often the best course is to ask rather than tell.
This will make meetings last longer. There will not be answers to all questions. They will have to be followed up later, but it is all worth it. After a while the team will be more cohesive and actually require less direction.
The structure of the organization in which you work can also have a profound impact on the quality of your communications. A hierarchical structure is very good for top-down communication, but seems to resist communication in the other direction. Bottom-up listening seems to be in very short supply.
Those who argue they don't have the time to listen to the people below them are missing the point.
Phil, thanks so much for this post. It’s so very relevant to the issues contained within organizations today. The Dilbert cartoon, I’ll add, is a very poignant reminder of my experiences in government, especially my last several years before retiring. The guilty will remain unnamed, but the fastest way to disempower talented professionals is to place barriers between their efforts and those requesting advice: the proverbial food chain of command. On a positive note was one former deputy minister at a department I worked at who actually insisted that the officer in charge of the file be present at briefings. Imagine that! But that’s exceedingly rare.
When we talk about fear in the workplace, I “fear” that despite the hype about risk-taking and the “learning organization” in the public sector that we’re in reality on downward spiral, in which sticking one’s neck up to object or to suggest a contravening idea results in one’s head being shot off.
The implications for leadership in an evolving workforce are significant. For example, how long will Gen Y tolerate this? How will Gen X, as it assumes the leadership mantle, address the issue of fear in the workplace? How will Baby Boomers in their remaining years in government work it out?
Thanks for spurring some thinking and conversation. Anyone out there disagree with my perspectives?
By Jim Taggart on 2011/04/09
Jim, thanks for your comment, it is an important point that you bring up, that I did not emphasize. The downside of this matter is that talented professionals are completely dis-empowered by the lack of genuine listening - interpreted as appreciation, or some kind of assessment of their worth.
Of course, I find that the word ‘empowerment’ is not exactly welcome in management circles these days either.
I do hope that, as you mention, that the so-called generation ‘y’ won’t put up with it any more. My fear is that corporations feel that there is little value in this type of training, so while the “y"ers know what they want they will not know how to achieve it.
By Phil Hawkins on 2011/04/11