Don't Act Now
It'll happen in the next five minutes. You might not even make it to the end of this post before it does. A member of your team is on their way to you right now — in person, by email, through IM — with their version of choice:
"Do you have a minute?"
"Can I ask you something?"
"I just wanted to check if it's okay that we… "
Whether it's in person or when we notice the red badge on our messaging app, it's in that moment that we have the opportunity to set ourselves apart from the vast majority of leaders and managers in the world. It is in that moment — when your team offers you the opportunity to disempower them — that you can politely decline.
The temptation to answer — to jump in and save the day — is incredibly strong. It's not a stretch to call it an addiction, because it gives us a feeling that who we are is enough.
The most common form this addiction takes in the modern office is telling our team that "our door is always open". What we really mean by that is, "before you walk through that open door you have assumed the accountability to take not just one, but at least five 'micro-steps'":
- You've done some research to look for the answer on your own (professionalism).
- You've asked at least one other member of the team before coming to me (collaboration).
- You're not coming to vent or complain about a colleague (self-responsibility).
- You're not coming to me to save you from having to take a risk (vulnerability).
- You're not using me to cover a skill they don't have (transparency).
The problem is that answering their question before they've taken these steps feels good. But in fact, we've done exactly the opposite.
A team of people who aren't challenged to think for themselves will default to the easy answers on the hard questions.