As this week has unfolded there have been some profound reactions to the forming of the Coalition Government. Those in support, have hailed it as a new dawn; those opposing it suggest it’s doomed for failure. Yesterday, some one suggested to Nicky Campbell on Five Live that it should be law that no one should criticise it for the first 6 months to give it time to bed in and succeed. Nicky wasn’t best pleased and suggested that would make it a dictatorship akin to Stalin or Mussolini and not the open, inclusive reign that it declares itself to be.
Isn’t it interesting how we can view exactly the same situation and have extremely contrasting interpretations depending on your perspective?
When we are within a system, that system shapes our perspective. As a leader in an organisation you are part of the ‘leadership system’ and as a front-line Agent, for example, you are part of the ‘staff system’. As such, you are likely to have differences of opinions based on your inclusion in one system or the other. And whilst we might like to think that we know what people in another system are thinking, we simply can’t.
The impact of this is profound. Over time, for staff, it breeds cynicism and distrust; a desire to tow the line rather than excel and for leaders it propagates the belief that staff do as little as possible to get by (but they wouldn’t dare openly admit it, instead they just act as if it were true), a focus on task rather than spending the time with their teams, reporting through email and numbers rather than face to face and with feeling. Connection is lost.
Our ability to connect in today’s fast moving world is essential. We connect to things, technology, people. We share information at an unprecedented rate and without this connection we will be ‘at sea’. Organisations change products and processes almost daily without a manager being truly connected to their staff how can staff possibly interpret and apply these changes at speed?
But all is not lost, time is a great healer. No-one really knows whether the coalition will last and if it can achieve what it suggests. But time will tell. No-one really knows if you will be the great leader you want to be, only time will tell and the decisions you make. So a question, “What information do you need to uncover in order to help you on this path?”
Connectivity and interdependence between individuals in teams is key. Realising this fact I put aside my cynicism towards the ClegCam partership and hope that they have the leadership skills within their own and joint adminstrations to pull their people together under the new LibCon umberella.
In business, the fast pace and structure of our organisations often assume connectivity and interdependence are present and working in our teams often without acknowledging what people do and feel in reality.
Building trust when you are at the top of a hierarchy is essential if you want your team to work with well together and also easier to write than achieve. The decisions you take and the manner in which you communicate them can help or hinder you.
For me the qestion of how to build trust is one I have a responsibilty to ask as a leader. Sometimes I don’t get the right answer and sometimes I do, sometimes I know how I have arrived there n sometimes I don’t. I do know that when the foundation of trust is built, connections and tasks are far simpler and more rewarding. Let’s hope Clegg and Camron have figured it out.