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Transcript
Hey everyone, in this episode we’re going to talk about the dangers of tacit agreement.
You see, as leaders it can be hard sometimes to confront people. Part of our job is accountability. And it can be hard to confront, sometimes deal with other people’s emotions or how they respond, or just to take the effort to do it.
Being a leader requires hard work and part of that hard work is sometimes keeping people accountable. The thing about that is, if we don’t say something when somebody does something or doesn’t do is that we’re telling them it’s okay. By not saying something, we’re giving tacit agreement to it.
If your kids are late, and you don’t speak up
For example, for example, let’s say my curfew for my kids is 10 o’clock at night and they come home at 10:30 every night, but I never say anything. And night after night, they come in 10:30, 10:30, 10:30, 10:30, I never say anything. I just let them come in, they go to the room, done. By not saying anything, I have told them it was okay.
It then becomes unfair for me, weeks down the road, to suddenly say, “Oh, you’re in trouble now because it’s 10:30,” because I’ve told them it was okay by not saying anything before. Does that kind of make sense?
When your team has negative behaviors and you don’t speak up
When your team has negative behaviors, let’s say someone’s late and they’re constantly late, by you not saying anything to them about being late, what you’re telling them is, “That’s okay.”
And then, especially if it’s over time, for you not to say anything and then suddenly come to them and you get them in trouble for being late, that’s unfair for you to do that.
If someone’s having some negative behavior toward others, maybe they’re being rude or negative or they are speaking out and attacking people there in meetings but you don’t say anything, by you not saying anything you’re saying that’s okay. Especially over time.
It’s especially dangerous when you get into things like harassment and you don’t say anything about it. You are giving silent approval because you’re not dealing.
When people don’t meet expectations, and you don’t speak up
It’s the same thing with expectations. If you have high expectations, and I do, I hope you do have high expectations for your team and you have high standards, these are expectations, these are standards, this is what I expect, then if you don’t hold people to that, if you don’t hold them accountable, then you’re saying those expectations aren’t real, those standards aren’t real, that you’re not serious about them.
If you want things done a certain way and they’re never done that way, there’s a lot of errors but you never say anything, then people are going to keep doing it.
Not only that, if someone is constantly late, if someone is constantly not living up to the standards and expectations and you don’t say anything, and the rest of your team who is trying to live up to the standards and doing what they are supposed to do, they see you not saying anything, you are letting them know you are not serious, but it also could build resentment towards you because they are putting in the work, but this person isn’t and you are not doing anything about it.
What I mean by “holding people accountable”
You need to make sure that you hold people accountable to the standards. And it’s not about the mentality of “I’m going to come and get you, I’m going to punish you, I’m going to find you doing wrong.” That’s not what I’m talking about.
If someone’s late, probably the first thing you should do is talk to them like, “Hey, what’s going on? I see that you’ve been late. What happened?” And to see what’s going on.
Are they being lazy or is it traffic? Is it some sick kid? Why are they late?
We should always give people the benefit of the doubt. We should assume the positive. If someone’s work is not up to expectations, especially if it was before, instead of attacking them for it, talk to them about it.
Sometimes the best thing is asking questions. “Hey, tell me what you thought about the report you turned in. Do you think that quality meets the standards that we’re trying to do?”
Ask questions, see if you can get them… sometimes they know their work’s not up to par and then you can find out why, what’s going on with them.
If someone’s being lazy, someone’s doing something like that, then yeah, you may take other steps over time and deal with that, but your mentality should be benefit of the doubt, assume the positive, and work to help people be their best, but you’re holding them accountable.
How to start holding people accountable if you haven’t been before
Now, what you do if you haven’t been saying anything, but you want to start saying anything, you want to reestablish those standards, you want to say, “Hey, this is not okay,” there’s a couple things you can do.
First, especially if it’s like in the meeting situation, you reestablish the expectations. And you may, before that, talk to the people who were causing those issues, talk to them one-on-one. Then in the meeting, “Hey, this is expectations. I have not been enforcing it, and that’s on me. I take responsibility for that. From now on, we are going to hold to these standards. This is how we act in our meetings.”
And then from then on, you start moving forward. If someone’s been late and you’ve allowed it, then you say, “Hey, I notice you’ve been late. I haven’t been saying anything. So from, but that is our expectation to be on time. So from this point forward, we’re gonna have to start dealing with the lateness if you’re not on time.” If that makes sense.
So you’re not just going to punish, you say, you reestablish this expectations. This is what’s going to happen. This is what we’re going to do. And then from then forward, then you start enforcing those expectations against.
Just like with your kid or my kid, 10:30 every night, pull him aside, “Hey, the expectation is 10 o’clock. I haven’t said anything, that’s on me. That’s my fault for not saying anything. But starting from tonight, I expect you at 10 o’clock. And starting from tonight, if you’re not in on time, then we’ll have to start having consequences.”
That make sense? So, when you don’t say anything, that’s tacit approval. You’re given approval by not speaking up or holding people accountable to your standards, behaviors, whatever it may be. So you want to make sure that you speak up.
If you haven’t then re-establish those expectations and then move forward doing that. I hope this helps.
