So I'm trying to not giggle to myself at the thought of you reading this post and grabbing your phone to check your teeth But "things getting stuck in your teeth" has been the topic of conversation in more than one of my People Management Done Differently training sessions this week And obviously, I don't mean your physical teeth - so I'll explain what I do mean In the people-management workshops we deliver, we talk through layers of need and expectation that the people in our teams have of us as their managers. First and foremost is that they need to know:
what is expected of them,
what 'good' looks like, and
how that 'good' is going to be measured
The next layer we talk about is understanding where their role fits in the larger machine of the organisation. And then there are other layers on top of those two. But where we regularly find resistance, friction and relationship challenges between colleagues and teams, is that we don't always identify, articulate and include the needs our colleagues have of us in order meet the expectations of their roles, when were mapping and confirming expectations in our roles - we always focus on the cog centre of their roles and not the cog teeth. And the teeth are the part where their role meets up with the roles and responsibilities of others.
So, when defining what is expected of a fundraiser (for example) we talk about relationship building, storytelling, pipeline and income. And in a job description we might list key relationships with colleague groups. But all too often we don't also add into the "what does good look like " the elements where they need to provide information to the finance team, or to the comms team, or to the service delivery team, so that colleagues in those teams are able to deliver the cog-centre of their roles. And so these parts of need and expectation get stuck in different people's cog-teeth When we map these Interdependencies™ we are able to identify where colleagues rely on each other for input into their own role delivery right around our organisations So, are you now worried that there might be something for someone else that is stuck in your teeth? Or are you now aware why something you need might be stuck in someone else's teeth? Who do you need to talk to in order to get those teeth clean, evenly spaced, and working well together to drive the machinery of your organisation and not to contribute towards it getting stuck?
If you like to know more about our Interdependencies™ work or about our management training, drop me an email - I'd love to chat
Claire xx
claire@claire-warner.com