Hey Boss, Stop Solving the Team’s Problems!
This is a weird situation. You were likely promoted into leadership
because you excelled at problem-solving and getting things done. You have naturally
used those skills to help your team succeed, but at what cost?
What’s the common factor in all those questions? That’s
easy—it is you! Your choices and actions keep your team from sharing the burden
of problem-solving. There is hope, though. You can start changing how you
interact with your team to help them run smoothly, even if you cannot be
immediately available.
Your Job Is Not to Solve Problems
First things first, it is time to acknowledge that your job
is no longer about solving problems. You
are supposed to create an environment that empowers your team to solve
problems. You have a team of intelligent people who are more than capable of
taking on these challenges. All they need is for you to get out of the way.
Your job is to be clear about what the team must accomplish,
but not how they do it. As a leader, you should clarify outcomes, define
boundaries, and share information.
Clarify Outcomes
This is about ensuring your team understands what needs to
be delivered as they support business goals and updating that direction as
information changes. As a goal moves through levels of leadership, it starts relatively
vague, and each leader adds the details needed for their team. This is where you do your work; make sure to
understand the required outcome, and then add a layer of details for your team.
Think of it like sharing on a map and describing the finish
line of a race, but not the way racers should travel the course. Maybe they
choose to walk, run, roller-skate, drive, or fly. Ultimately, deciding how to
travel the race most effectively is where your team should be experts and make decisions.
At some point, at higher levels of leadership, there may be a
point where the role is about finding problems with systems that appear to be
working. Then, convince the team that a
problem should be solved and help define it. This is a topic for another time.
Define Boundaries
This is about clearly communicating what rules the team
should follow. These can be about the number of people available, budgets, business
requirements, customer timelines, or processes. The fewer rules you put in
place, the more your team’s creativity will flow.
Using the race analogy, add information about the course's
route after you have shared the location and description of the finish line.
Where are the turns? What is the general direction in which they should start?
Some situations may require you to define very narrow
boundaries. These may be laws, regulations, or policies that must be followed.
Sometimes, we need to live with these but be flexible elsewhere.
Share Information
What data can you give the team to help inform their
decisions? I believe that most people will make the same decision given the
same information. As a leader, you are in a position to have more direct and
indirect access to information to help the team accomplish its goals. Use your extra
information to help your team understand the bigger picture. Be sure to consistently
update this information as you learn more and the project evolves.
Things to think about:
Metrics the project must achieve.
Information about past projects.
Expectations of customers.
Expectations of leaders above you.
Bringing back the race analogy, describe things about the
race and course to help them decide how to travel the course. These would be
topics like: Is the path paved or dirt? Will the race be conducted during the
day or night? Will there be spectators? How long is the course? Is it going to
be summer or winter?
What to Pay attention to
Before you can successfully empower your team to solve
problems, there are some things you should learn to recognize. These situations
look like solving problems before assigning work to your team and solving
problems when your team asks you to.
Solving Problems Before Your Team
Surprisingly, these will be the more straightforward
situations to recognize and change. Many of these will happen when working with
your boss or peers to determine which problems should be solved. Other times,
they will come up when setting longer-term strategies and visions for your
team.
As these situations evolve, you will likely have an idea
about how your team should work through the problem, and that is OK. This is often part of the process we follow
in clarifying the racecourse. You should begin questioning this process when you
get to the level of defining steps and outline a process that must be followed.
These are the how parts of the problem; let your team define those.
When Your Team Asks
These are the most difficult problem-solving situations to
avoid. In these cases, your team will
come to you with questions about what they should or can do. Your natural
tendency will be to keep them from being stuck and quickly answering their
question.
You can recognize these situations by listening for these kinds of questions:
Am I allowed to ….?
Do I/we ….?
Can I/wen…?
What should I/we do …?
How should I/we …?
Making a Shift
When you notice a situation in which you are following your
natural tendency to problem-solve, it's time to pause and take a different
approach. Take a moment and remember that you are here to define the finish
line and racecourse. The team should be figuring out how they will tackle the
race. Follow these two steps to shift problem-solving back to the team. 1. Reiterate
the goal/outcome. Ask an open-ended question about the next steps.
Step One - Reiterate
Respond to each situation by reiterating all or part of the project's
goals/vision and sharing some information that may help them understand the
context.
Know that once you have repeated yourself so many times that
you cannot fathom saying it one more time, you are probably about halfway
there.
Step Two – Open Ended Questions
Great open-ended questions start with What, How, When, Where,
and Who. I prefer to focus on What and
How questions because they often get teams to start offering solutions. Here
are some idea starters:
Based on our goal of ____:
What do you think makes sense here?
How do you think we should move forward?
Who can we chat with to get more information?
Where should we start?
Where does this fit into the process?
What needs to come first?
Remember that the outcome is essential, not the how. If the answer given will lead to the right outcome,
then gracefully get out of the way and let your team do what they do best. If
you have doubts about the answer given, then share some extra information that
may not have been considered and see what changes.
Repeat these two steps until you are reasonably satisfied with
their plan.
Problems You Should Solve
OK, this post hasn’t been completely honest about problem-solving.
There are problems that are important for you to tackle and should be a focus
for you. These problems typically relate to Human Resources, such as compensation,
conflict, hiring, performance management, and company politics.
Unfortunately, many of these are parts of the job leaders dread
needing to solve. Remember that your job is to create an environment that empowers
your team to solve problems. The topics
listed above are critical environmental factors that need to be balanced.
I would also encourage you to find a project not directly
related to your team’s responsibilities to tackle on the side. Use this as a
way to flex your problem-solving muscles and keep yourself engaged with the
business.
Wrapping Up
Your primary job for your team should be to create an
environment that empowers them to solve the business problems in front of them.
You should clarify outcomes, define boundaries, and share information as they
work through the course.
Pay attention to the times when you start defining steps and
outlining the processes that must be followed. Also, pause when your team asks
questions about the steps or process. These are unintentional traps where you
will fall into problem-solving mindsets.
Bring them into the conversation by reiterating the goal, sharing information, and asking open-ended questions.
If you are looking for extra support in developing this critical
leadership skill, consider contacting me.
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