Manager by Design

What to do when someone on your team resists change (part 2)

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 14 May 2012 15:30:19 +0000

In my previous article, I describe the importance of not attacking a change agent, but instead taking steps to manage the change, not the change agent. Many managers receive “feedback” that is resistance to change, and then turn around and give that feedback to the change agents, implying that the manager doesn’t actually want the change agent to instigate the change.

The first five steps to this were: 1. Listen 2. Document the issue 3. Track the issues. 4. Delay in responding to them 5. Look at the issues as a team.

Today, I provide tips on what to do next:

6. Communicate your findings – the more targeted the better

You typically know the source of the resistance/complaint. You tracked it, right? Now you can respond directly to that person. Explain what you did (discussed it as a team) and what you plan to do (keep going with the change, most likely). I am not a fan of communicating broadly the list of concerns and the responses, because it is somewhat akin to public feedback. By communicating broadly, you are trying to adjust the thinking for a specific person via communicating with a broad group. This creates unintended consequence of changing the broad group’s thinking when it isn’t necessarily a problem. It’s better to circle back to the person who expressed the concern in the first place. If there is a network of people who believe the same thing, that person then gets to address the results.

7. Express thanks and ask the person to contribute to the change

As you circle back to the person who raised the concerns, express thanks and empathy to the person. Here’s what that looks like: “Thank you for expressing your concerns. This took courage and indicates you are looking out for the interests of the group and your colleagues.” Then explain the course you plan to take (most likely moving forward with the change). Then ask the person to contribute to the change, “Can I count on you to help us in moving forward with this and doing your part?

8. Track that you had the conversation

Just as when you tracked the initial complaint, you can track the follow-up conversation. This proves that you listened to and addressed the resistance/complaint. It also reinforced why you are moving forward with the change. It also passes a test as to whether you, the manager, wanted the change in the first place.

9. Assess the results of the change

Then there’s the macro-issue of the change itself. There were the complaints, and then there are the macro issues of the change. Did the change actually happen? Did it get the results you were looking for? Are the things better than before? Was it worth it? If so, then the resistances/complaints you received were a part of this process of change. The resistances you experienced along the way were an indicator that the change was happening, rather than an indicator that the change was bad.

10. Celebrate the results with everyone

The project team (or change agents) that create the change should be praised, but all who experienced the change also should understand the results. This is where I do support public feedback – feedback that focuses on reinforcing positive behaviors by the larger group that the larger group needs to continue performing. The larger group should be made aware of:

What the change was.
What the intent of the change was
What the results was
How everyone contributed to these results by working on the change (even and perhaps especially the resistors.)

So rather than reacting to resistances from individuals by turning around and “providing feedback” to the change agent, use this process to use resistances as data and a means for improving both the change and bringing along those who are resistant to the change.

In this model, the change agent can focus on her strengths—creating change, and the manager can focus on his strengths – managing the change.

In your management design, do you have a chance for managers to practice this? Do you have any structures set up for managers to handle a “change event” that allows them to slip into a structure like this? Or do you rely on your managers to do this independently?

Related Articles:

What to do when someone on your team resists change (part 1)

Using perceptions to manage: How this undermines efforts for change

Are you asking a change agent to make a change, and then resisting the change?

Public feedback drives performance down and doesn’t count as performance management

How Public Feedback Can Make the Situation Worse

Four more reasons giving public feedback backfires

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What to do when someone on your team resists change (part 1)

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 07 May 2012 15:30:40 +0000

Many managers are in the position of instigating and overseeing change on the team, with the intent that this change improves how things are done and obtains better results.

But managers can quickly fall into the trap of resisting the change they instigated by reacting negatively to the ramifications of change, and seeking to eliminate all resistances (a.k.a., complaints) to the change.

They do this by treating incoming complaints of the change agent as a performance feedback opportunity to the change agent. This implies that the change can occur and without resistance and essentially undermines the change effort. This is a wrong assumption – it’s like assuming that there is no resistance when you start a car and move forward.

So here’s what to do when someone on your team resists change:

1. Listen

Allow the person to hear out the person’s issues with the change. The only action is to listen to the issues or complaints that the person has. Instead of responding to the issue, listen to the issue. Say, “Thank you for expressing your concerns.” Add some empathy, “I understand that this can be difficult.”

2. Track the concerns

To prove that you are listening, actually write down the concerns. Write them down in front of the person expressing them. Tell them that you are writing them down. Say, “I appreciate your taking the time to express these concerns. I’m going to make sure I have your concerns tracked, is that O.K.?”

3. Put the concerns in a central location

You probably aren’t the only one receiving complaints. Upon the first complaint, this is your clue that there may be more. Find a place for others on your team to document them. Put them in the same place.

4. Put a time delay on resistances before responding to them

Many complaints are reactions to the first hints of the change. They may be founded or unfounded complaints. The important thing is to respond to them in a measured way. One way to do this is to put a time delay on reacting to the complaints. It may be a day, a week or a month. In any case, reacting to the complaint during the moment is empowering the complaint over the planning that hopefully was more systematic. Don’t immediately bring in the change agent (most likely where the complaint is directed) and ask them to respond to the issue.

5. Take a look at all of the complaints in a team environment

Note that I haven’t recommended ignoring the resistances. Instead, I’m recommending packaging them and looking at them with an analytic eye. When receiving a complaint about change in your organization, it is easy to respond emotionally and want to resolve the complaint right away. Instead, find a structured time to go through this with the team implementing the change to assess the following things:

a) Whether the concern is important

b) Whether it provides insight on whether or not to continue with the change effort

c) Whether it will fade over time as one grows accustomed to the change

By doing this analysis, you can better assess whether the complaints/resistances can give you insights to course-correct or stay on course with the change. Some complaints may be very insightful and tell you the where the change creates new problems. This may appear as resistance, but it is actually help.

In my next article, I’ll provide more steps to help guide your team through a change.

Related Articles:

What to do when someone on your team resists change (part 2)

Using perceptions to manage: How this undermines efforts for change

Are you asking a change agent to make a change, and then resisting the change?

A tool for how to tell if feedback is relevant to your job

What inputs should a manager provide performance feedback on?

When to provide performance feedback using direct observation: Practice sessions

When to provide performance feedback using direct observation: On the job

Areas of focus in providing performance feedback based on direct observation: Tangible artifacts

What managers can do about “intangible human-based artifacts”

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Are you asking a change agent to make a change, and then resisting the change?

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 15:30:49 +0000

Many managers want to get great results. To do this, they seek and find high performers who drive toward these results. One way a high performer can achieve great results is through creating and implementing structures and processes that provide ongoing value and systemic improvement. Or, in other words, change.

The high performer is a change agent. This is what managers want. Managers want change for the better, and rely on the “high performers” to instigate and implement the change. That’s what makes them a high performer.

But there is a mistake that many current managers make in seeing this model through: They give feedback to the person instigating the change that there is resistance to the change. This is a flaw in current management design, and one that is all too common.

Here’s what I mean:

When change occurs in an organization, there inevitably will be complaints about the change. The complaints will be about whoever is instigating the change. It doesn’t matter if it is good or bad change, people somewhere in the organization will be resistant to the change. This is normal and part of the “change curve.” The complaints will be inevitably be about the person instigating the change. That was supposedly the high performer, who was encouraged by the manager to create the change.

Many managers react to the resistance or backlash to the change by “giving feedback” to the change agent. The feedback may be, “There were some complaints about the process you implemented. . .”

The manager is essentially asking that there be positive change in the organization but without the residual effects of change. A harmonious and beautiful change with no complaints seems to be the goal.

This is absurd, of course. Does the manager want the change, or does the manager want harmony?

If the manager wants the change, the feedback should be based on the following order of importance:

Did the change occur?
Did the change help the thing turn out for the better?
Did people experiencing the change have a chance to express their concerns?

Many managers will focus on number 3, and make two mistakes in the process.

They’ll first assume that any expression of concern (a.k.a., complaint) is something that could have been avoided or eliminated.
This is the responsibility of the change agent, and not the manager or other stakeholders in the change to listen and address the concerns/complaints.

If a manager gives feedback that asks a change agent to implement the change without any concerns, then the manager is asking the impossible. It isn’t change unless there is some resistance. In fact, if a change agent says that a change occurred and there was no resistance, this is an indicator that there actually wasn’t change.

So managers – if you have the privilege of having a change agent on your team, focus your discussions on the first two things: Is the change occurring? Are you getting the results of the change?

The third thing – the complaints and concerns from those experiencing the change, is of third-order importance (note that it is still important), and should be an area where the manager should help the change agent, rather than “give feedback” that there were complaints.

The manager should listen and understand the resistances, and learn from them. But the task at hand is not throw them back at the change agent and then use it as proof that the change agent did something wrong (perhaps at the next performance review?).

Instead, the manager should see the complaints as evidence that something is going right, and give positive reinforcement to the change agent that this is the case.

For you management designers out there – do you have a method to ensure managers keep from undermining the change they supposedly want?

Related articles:

Using perceptions to manage: How this undermines efforts for change

What to do when someone on your team resists change (part 1)

A tool for how to tell if feedback is relevant to your job

What inputs should a manager provide performance feedback on?

When to provide performance feedback using direct observation: Practice sessions

When to provide performance feedback using direct observation: On the job

Areas of focus in providing performance feedback based on direct observation: Tangible artifacts

What managers can do about “intangible human-based artifacts”

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Using perceptions to manage: How this undermines efforts for change

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 15:30:39 +0000

This is the latest in a series of articles about how using perceptions in managing a team can be a recipe for disaster.

Think about the manager who says, “There’s a perception that you expect too much of other people” or “There’s a perception that you are not very well liked.” This is the manager attempting to manage perceptions and not behaviors, and is something that needs to be banned from the manager’s vocabulary. I provide reasons here, here, here, here and here (there’s a perception that this is a very thorough series!).

In today’s article, I discuss how negative perceptions are often a symptom of positive change:

In a previous article I discuss the scenario of Arnold, a team member that provided suggestions and helped implement changes on a team that produced greater productivity and lower cost. In the process, there were some negative perceptions about Arnold, “You’ve done a lot of things since joining the team, but there’s a perception that you want to change things too fast, and that you expect the team to do too much.” Let’s take a look at what this means:

Citing perceptions often reveals change agents at work and then undermines them

If a manager can cite only negative perceptions of someone as the negative impact, then this could be an indicator that the person could actually a positive change agent in the workplace. Many people are resistant to change, and when someone brings it to the organization, that resistance will manifest as undifferentiated negative perceptions that quickly propagate through the organization. The actual change may be good and improve things, but with any change the initial perception is that the change is bad in some way.

In the example of Arnold above, he created positive change with the positive results of the organization. The down-side of the change is that there are some negative perceptions of what Arnold does, i.e. “Arnold is making us do stuff we don’t want to do.”

Many managers will get very nervous about this negative response to change, and instead of supporting the change, they will support the negative response and try to mitigate it. Managers will focus their efforts at whatever Arnold is doing and get him to stop or change what he is doing.

So if a manager feels the urge to give feedback to an employee that there is a negative perception of what they are doing, this should immediately be given a second thought to the manager that perhaps the employee is actually a change agent who is activating the “antibodies” of the organization to attack the change agent.

If the manager does not want the change agent to make changes, then the feedback needs to be given to the employee that the organization does not need change and is fine the way it is (however unlikely and absurd this is). If the manager wants the employee to keep making the changes, then the manager should focus the attention at giving the feedback to the employees about handling change in the organization.

Many managers want it both ways: They want change for the better, but without their team experiencing the symptoms of change, such as resistance and complaints about the change.

As a result, managers will choose the path of trying to get the change agent to manage perceptions of the change agent’s actions. It is a path that undermines the change, implies that the status quo is acceptable, and the manager him or herself is resistant to change.

It also defers the work of managing change to the change agent himself, when this is precisely something that the manager has greater power to control.

So if you are a manager and are starting to get worried about some grumblings on the team, the first course of action is to consider whether the grumblings are natural by-products of change. Make sure you don’t immediately undermine the desired positive change by becoming part of the attack on the change agent.

Are you asking a change agent to make a change, and then resisting the change?

Performance feedback must be related to a performance

A model to determine if performance feedback is relevant to job performance

A second phantom job many employees have: Managing perceptions of others

Using perceptions to manage: Three reasons why this messes things up

Using perceptions to manage: Three more reasons “There’s a perception that. . .” should be removed from a manager’s vocabulary

Using perceptions to manage: Three unintended consequences, or, how a manager can create a gossip culture in one easy step

Using perceptions to manage: Are positive perceptions cited?

Using perceptions to manage: What does this reveal about the manager?

Using perceptions to manage: What does this tell us about the manager’s feedback providing skills?

Using perceptions to manage: An example of how to transform a perception into improved performance feedback

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Using perceptions to manage: An example of how to transform a perception into improved performance feedback

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 15:30:58 +0000

In today’s article, I take an instance of when a manager feels compelled to use the line “There’s a perception that. . .” as a means to give performance feedback. For example, a manager may intend to “help” the employee by saying, “There’s a perception that you are difficult to work with.” The implied notion is that the perception is the negative impact, and “being difficult to work with” is the behavior that needs to change.

However, this is badly given performance feedback, and there is an alternative!

Citing perceptions as feedback is the reverse order of good performance feedback, so let’s turn it around.

Here are the (compressed) steps for giving performance feedback:

Start with the context
Describe the observed behavior
(Only if it isn’t clear what the impact is) cite the impact of the behavior
Offer alternate behavior.

Let’s take the example of a manager who attempts to give feedback by saying the following:

“There’s a perception that you’re difficult to work with.”

By leading with the perception, manager reverses the order of feedback and eliminates the other steps. It starts and ends with the so-called impact: The negative perception of being difficult to work with. Aside from the generalization of the employee being difficult to work with, there are no cited behaviors that lead up to the perception. The impact, however ephemeral, is the feedback.

Properly given feedback needs to include the context, behaviors, and then the impact (and that impact isn’t entirely necessary), and then the alternate behavior. So instead of “There’s a perception that you are difficult to work with,” it could be constructed as the following:

1. (Context) In your request last week for a new report. . .

2. (Behavior) You wrote in the email, “Don’t be stupid. . .”

(You might want to have a discussion at this point in the feedback to ask the feedback receiver why they wrote this)

3a. (Impact – Using the “perception” impact) “This creates the perception that you are difficult to work with”

4. (Alternate recommended behavior) Instead of calling the recipient “stupid”, take this content out of your email and stick to the request.

Once adding the more of the appropriate steps for giving performance feedback, it shows a few things:

The impact of the behavior is clearer. In this example, when the manager cited only the impact of (that there is a perception that the employee is difficult to work with), it misses out the other, much more substantial impacts of the behavior: “Your comment eroded the efforts we’ve made to make this a positive work environment.” There are other impacts as well: “Your comment did not make it any more likely to get the report on time.” If you are relying on perceptions to give performance feedback, then you are probably actually missing out of more significant impacts of negative behaviors – if there are any.
Citing the impact isn’t entirely necessary. When focusing on the behavior, it reveals the impact more clearly in the discussion. The person receiving the feedback could likely offer their own version of what the impact is: “I bet they didn’t like it when I wrote that.” It is not necessary to inventory all of the negative impacts of a behavior. As long as the person receiving the feedback sees that it is a negative impact, then this step can be considered completed.
Focuses on the new expected behavior. With the behavior-based feedback, you stop worrying about the perceptions and focus more on whether the behaviors will be corrected. This new focus will drive at behaviors that will improve perceptions over time. So if you are worried about changing perceptions, you need to get to the behaviors the need to change.

So there is how you can transform the urge to use perceptions, get rid of the perceptions line, and turn it into better, more effective performance feedback.

In my next article, I will discuss how managing perceptions are often used to undermine desired behavior in the workplace.

Related articles:

Using perceptions to manage: Three reasons why this messes things up

Using perceptions to manage: Three more reasons “There’s a perception that. . .” should be removed from a manager’s vocabulary

Using perceptions to manage: Three unintended consequences, or, how a manager can create a gossip culture in one easy step

Using perceptions to manage: Are positive perceptions cited?

Using perceptions to manage: What does this reveal about the manager?

Using perceptions to manage: What does this tell us about the manager’s feedback providing skills?

Using perceptions to manage: How this undermines efforts for change

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Using perceptions to manage: What does this tell us about the manager’s feedback providing skills?

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 15:30:31 +0000

Today I continue my series of articles on the impact of a manager using perceptions to manage. Frequently, managers start feedback by saying, “There’s a perception that. . .” For example, “There’s a perception that. . . you need to improve your communication skills.” Or “There’s a perception that. . . you are not confident.”

When a manager adds the perception line, it creates all sorts of chaos. Check here, here, here, here and here, for some reasons behind this chaos. But it also give us insight on how performance feedback can be improved by understanding why a manager wants to use the “perception” line in giving feedback.

Here is what we can learn about the actual feedback being provided when the manager breaks out perceptions as the key ingredient to the feedback.

17. The feedback is not specific and not immediate

Using the line, “There’s a perception that” is automatically a modifying clause that takes you one step away from the specificity and immediacy of whatever behavior is being discussed and asked to be modified.

The feedback is by definition not immediate since a time lag is generated: There was a behavior, then there was a perception.

The feedback is by definition not specific, because the discussion is about the perception and not the behavior. The discussion centers around the non-specific perception and distracts away from the specific behavior.

In order for feedback to be effective, it needs to be specific and immediate.

18. Citing perceptions is not enough impact

One could argue that perceptions are the impact of a behavior, and citing perceptions as the impact of a behavior is part of performance feedback. Indeed I do encourage that anyone attempting to provide performance feedback identify the impact of the behaviors in question. To learn more, see here for what should be documented on a performance log.

But here’s the issue: If the only negative impact of a behavior that you can cite is negative perceptions, then perhaps the impact isn’t worth correcting. Here’s an example:

Arnold joins a team and identifies many inefficiencies in the work processes. Arnold proposes new processes that are more efficient and generate higher quality. Some of these processes are put in place and indeed, the team operates at a higher level and key performance indicators are improved.

Now the feedback from the manager, “You’ve done a lot of things since joining the team, but there’s a perception that you want to change things too fast, and that you expect the team to do too much.” The positive impact of Arnold’s actions have been to improve team efficiency and effectiveness, but the negative impact is that there is a perception that Arnold drives the team too hard.

OK, if that perception is the only negative impact that the manager can cite, is this really a negative impact?

I would argue that if you can identify something that Arnold said or did that actually hurt the team, then it should be cited. If Arnold did indeed display a negative behavior, such as yelling at the team members, this impact does not need to be tied not to perceptions, but some other impact: The yelling undermined the team expectations for how people work with one another, caused a flurry of discussion about Arnold’s temper which distracted from getting work done. In an upcoming article, I’ll elaborate more about Arnold’s situation as a change agent.

If, indeed, the negative impact of Arnold’s behavior was “driving the team to change too fast, the actual negative impact would be lack of adoption of the change, or a decrease in ability of the team to get work done.

So when a manager uses what I call “the perceptions line”, this means that the manager has more work to do prior to giving feedback.

Related Articles:

Using perceptions to manage: Three reasons why this messes things up

Using perceptions to manage: Three more reasons “There’s a perception that. . .” should be removed from a manager’s vocabulary

Using perceptions to manage: Three unintended consequences, or, how a manager can create a gossip culture in one easy step

Using perceptions to manage: Are positive perceptions cited?

Using perceptions to manage: What does this reveal about the manager?

Using perceptions to manage: An example of how to transform a perception into improved performance feedback

Performance feedback must be related to a performance

A model to determine if performance feedback is relevant to job performance

A second phantom job many employees have: Managing perceptions of others

The Art of Providing Feedback: Make it Specific and Immediate

An example of giving specific and immediate feedback and a frightening look into the alternatives

Examples of when to offer thanks and when to offer praise

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Using perceptions to manage: What does this reveal about the manager?

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 15:30:23 +0000

Today I continue my extended series on managers using perceptions to manage. Have you ever had a manager who leads feedback with “There’s a perception that. . .”? As in, “There’s a perception that your projects don’t come in on time.” Or “There’s a perception that you don’t know how to manage your budget.”

In previous articles, I’ve listed 12 reasons this behavior should be removed (here, here, here, and here). If you find this entertaining reading that may resonate for both employees and managers alike.

So let’s continue this list, this time focusing on what managing using perceptions reveals about the manager.

13. The manager is exposed to similar tactics, indirect and direct back to the manager

The manager says, “There’s a perception that you don’t deliver.” This encourages the employee to think (in most cases) or say (in fewer cases) in response to the boss a similar kind of feedback:

“OK, there’s a perception that you’re a terrible boss and don’t know what you’re doing.” Or perhaps, “There’s a perception that you don’t know how to give performance feedback.”

By using the “there’s a perception that” line, it essentially trains the employees to think and use back at you the same damaging rhetoric being used on them. In fact, upon training the employee to think perceptions first, this is probably the thing in the employee that will most likely change.

The employees will start creating “perceptions” about the manager, and most likely they won’t be directly to the manager. Instead, they will extend the negative and difficult perceptions around the workplace about the manager.

Here’s where employees can do this:

1. One-one-discussions with the manager’s manager:

“There’s a perception that my manager is having a lot of difficulty managing the team.”

2. On 360-feedback forms:

“There’s a perception that my manager struggles a lot.”

3. To each other:

“There’s a perception that our manager isn’t comfortable giving feedback, no matter what we do or what results we get.

4. During exit interviews:

“There’s a perception that this is the worst-run team in the organization.”

Using the “There’s a perception that. . .” line reveals that you are a manager who wants to receive feedback via the veil of perceptions.

14. It demonstrates that the manager is not committed to the feedback and changing behaviors

When a manager uses the “there’s a perception that” line, it indicates that the manager himself is not sure as to what is true and what is not true. The manager is ultimately non-committal to the actual events, yet still feels comfortable giving “feedback.” This reveals the manager as a “gutless wonder” (thanks, “Strictly Ballroom!” for this term) who wants something to change, but is not committed to that change. As such, this reduces trust with the employee. Without the manager commitment to changing the behavior, this means that the manager will likely undermine either the changed behavior, or the unchanged behavior, creating an overall untrustworthy work relationship.

15. Creates and amplifies ambiguity

In a previous article, I cite the need for managers to reduce ambiguity, as this is what “dealing with ambiguity” means. However, many managers, in their day-to-day behaviors, end up creating ambiguity, and using the “there’s a perception that. . .” line when giving feedback is a prime example of this. By adding the complex phantom job of managing perceptions, employees have to guess who has what perception, and have to combat perceptions. This is hard and it is unclear what needs to be done next. Do you do your job? Do you manage perceptions? Whose perceptions do you manage – your peers’? Your customers’? Your boss’s? Your boss’s boss’s? This is a lot of ambiguity that is unnecessary.

16. Undermines efforts to find data, facts, and understanding

When a manager elevates the importance of managing perceptions, this automatically reduces the importance of using data, facts and seeking agreement of what’s true. This means that efforts to compile information, be data-driven in making decisions, and generating a team understanding of what is true are most likely to be tossed out the window and now considered quaint and unimportant. If being more data-driven in your decision making is important, then use data and not perceptions in making decisions. The moment perceptions are cited is the moment that data is not as important as generating perceptions, and it trains the team to focus on creating and perpetuating perceptions instead of creating and sharing data.

Related Articles:

Using perceptions to manage: Three reasons why this messes things up

Using perceptions to manage: Three more reasons “There’s a perception that. . .” should be removed from a manager’s vocabulary

Using perceptions to manage: Three unintended consequences, or, how a manager can create a gossip culture in one easy step

Using perceptions to manage: Are positive perceptions cited?

Using perceptions to manage: What does this reveal about the manager?

Using perceptions to manage: What does this tell us about the manager’s feedback providing skills?

Using perceptions to manage: An example of how to transform a perception into improved performance feedback

A tool for how to tell if feedback is relevant to your job

Performance feedback must be related to a performance

A model to determine if performance feedback is relevant to job performance

A second phantom job many employees have: Managing perceptions of others

Using perceptions to manage: How this undermines efforts for change

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Using perceptions to manage: Are positive perceptions cited?

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 15:30:27 +0000

Today I continue my extended series on managers using perceptions to manage the team. Imagine a manager who starts a performance feedback session with “There’s a perception that. . . you don’t actively participate.” Or “There’s a perception that. . . you’ve fallen behind on your work.”

I believe that these words, “There’s a perception that” need to be removed from a manager’s vocabulary. I provide three reasons here, Three more reasons here, and three more reasons here.

But I have more reasons! Today I examine why positive perceptions are not cited when managers manage perceptions.

10. “There’s a perception that. . .” is rarely used for positive things, underscoring the absurdity of the line

Have you ever noticed that a manager never sits down with an employee and says, “There’s a perception that you deliver on time with high quality and exceptional teamwork”? or “There’s a perception that you bring talents to the group that no one else has.” Or “There’s a perception that you designed and created an infrastructure that increased productivity by 40% and reduced costs by 60%”. Or perhaps a more pedestrian example, “There’s a perception that you’re always on time.”

Hmm. . . as soon as it’s positive things, the “perception” line seems to be unnecessary and weird. . .if the perception of the thing is a the positive thing. Managers who can articulate the positive thing don’t need to add the “There’s a perception that. . .”

11. It twists positive feedback into negative feedback even for positive behaviors and perceptions!

Let’s take a look at the below chart. In it we have an example of a manager giving negative “feedback” and positive “feedback” while inserting the “there’s a perception” line.

Normally, when you give positive feedback on something, it means that you want the employee to keep doing that behavior, or do it with more frequency. But in this chart, you can see that by adding the “there’s a perception” line to the positive feedback, the implication is that something is wrong – that the perception is false in some way and the perception needs to be adjusted to a more realistic perception. (Ironically, when the perception is a negative one, that perception is widely believed to be true.) On top of that, the implication is that the underlying behaviors that created that over-inflated perception also need to be changed so that future perceptions will be the more realistic perception.

So by adding the “there’s a perception” line to a positive behavior, it turns it into a negative perception and a negative behavior. Now the employee has to change both perceptions and the underlying behaviors – on something that is being praised!

In short, it becomes twisted when a positive perception implies that things need to change.

12. It complicates and what should be done differently

The point of feedback is to either change the behavior (corrective feedback) or extend the behavior (reinforcing feedback). But when adding the “There’s a perception” line to the feedback, it magnifies the complexity of what should be differently. In the negative feedback scenario, the employee needs to do two things: 1. Combat the perceptions and 2. Change the underlying behavior that created the perceptions. That’s really hard. Especially if you consider how the employee somehow got into the “negative perception” hole in the first place . . . now the feedback implies that the employee can somehow get out of it. Whatever created that negative perception in the first place was likely complex and external to the employee’s actual behaviors, so to imply that there’s a way to resolve this is a tall order.

In the positive feedback scenario, the employee is tasked with tempering the positive perception somehow, and with doing something differently that creates the (implied) overly positive perception. Both are complicated projects that are probably unending and unresolvable, and perhaps pointless.

When giving feedback, whether constructive or reinforcing, it is important to a) stick to the behavior that needs to change or continue – and b) to limit the discussion to as few behaviors as possible so that it is more accountable and actionable.

Adding the “there’s a perception that” line does the exact opposite of good practices in providing performance feedback.

Related articles:

Using perceptions to manage: Three more reasons “There’s a perception that. . .” should be removed from a manager’s vocabulary

Using perceptions to manage: Three unintended consequences, or, how a manager can create a gossip culture in one easy step

Using perceptions to manage: What does this tell us about the manager’s feedback providing skills?

Using perceptions to manage: An example of how to transform a perception into improved performance feedback

A tool for how to tell if feedback is relevant to your job

Performance feedback must be related to a performance

A model to determine if performance feedback is relevant to job performance

A second phantom job many employees have: Managing perceptions of others

Using perceptions to manage: How this undermines efforts for change

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Walter Oelwein featured on the Sources of Insight blog

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 15:30:54 +0000

Today, the Manager by Design blog takes a break from discussion about people and team management, and would like to share a guest post I wrote for the Sources of Insight blog. It’s a fun post that harkens back to my Nintendo of America days, when I taught a class on how to be a Game Play Counselor. J.D. Meier challenged me to write an article called “Life Lessons from The Legend of Zelda”, and here is the result!

Life Lessons from The Legend of Zelda and Zelda Theory

If you love The Legend of Zelda (and I know you do!), this is a must read!

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Using perceptions to manage: Three unintended consequences, or, how a manager can create a gossip culture in one easy step

Walter Oelwein — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 16:30:13 +0000

Today I continue my series on managers managing perceptions, and how attempting this creates difficult situations and doesn’t resolve problems. When I say, “Managing perceptions”, I’m thinking of when a manager attempts to use perceptions as the basis for what is being managed, rather than using observed behaviors to manage the team.

Imagine a manager who attempts to give feedback by saying, “There’s a perception that you are easily excitable” or “There’s a perception that you easily get confused.” That’s using perceptions to manage.

In previous articles, I discuss how this deflects from actual performance and creates confusion as to what is real and not real. In today’s article, I discuss some more unintended consequences of a manager relying on perceptions to manage the team – how it creates an instant culture of gossip.

7. Citing perceptions confirms that gossip, innuendo, and back-biting is acceptable and encouraged, if not the default

When a manager says, “There’s a perception that. . .” it confirms that gossip, innuendo, and back-biting is an acceptable and encouraged behavior, both by employees and the manager. By definition, invoking the perception concept is gossip, since it does not rely on any sort of fact or evidence. The only fact that is confirmed is that there is gossip, innuendo and, most likely, back-biting that is occurring. On top of this, gossip and innuendo is now the default mechanism for understanding what is going on with the team.

8. There is no mechanism for putting the perception to rest or confirming the reverse perception

An employee can do a lot to reverse perceptions, including changing the behavior that potentially introduced the perception, and, more likely, employing the counter-insurgent techniques of gossip, back-biting, etc. Having done this, when does the “perception” change? Who is the responsible party or governing body for saying, “There is a NEW perception!” There is none. It is highly likely that even if behaviors change, and even if perceptions change, and even if the people change, the “perception” will still linger as a trace, somewhere in the organization, and it will never be put to rest.

9. Citing perceptions creates seething, underlying and never-ending anger

Given that the negative perception tag has been created, and given that it never will go away, and it is, by definition, not tied to actual performance, you should expect the employee to have an ongoing, never-ending anger or resentment about this perception, whatever it is. This is commonly known as a “chip on your shoulder.” If you are a manager who wants to create these shoulder-chips, then the “There’s a perception” is the fast-track to this. It will surely create a negative work environment, reduce performance and eventually haunt you as a manager, since it encourages new rumors and perceptions about you.

In the next article in the series, I explore the likelihood of positive perceptions being cited when managing to perceptions.

Related articles:

A model to determine if performance feedback is relevant to job performance

A second phantom job many employees have: Managing perceptions of others

Using perceptions to manage: Three reasons why this messes things up

Using perceptions to manage: Three more reasons “There’s a perception that. . .” should be removed from a manager’s vocabulary

Using perceptions to manage: Are positive perceptions cited?

Using perceptions to manage: How this undermines efforts for change

Using perceptions to manage: What does this reveal about the manager?

Using perceptions to manage: What does this tell us about the manager’s feedback providing skills?

Using perceptions to manage: An example of how to transform a perception into improved performance feedback

A tool for how to tell if feedback is relevant to your job

What inputs should a manager provide performance feedback on?

When to provide performance feedback using direct observation: Practice sessions

When to provide performance feedback using direct observation: On the job

Areas of focus in providing performance feedback based on direct observation: Tangible artifacts

What managers can do about “intangible human-based artifacts”

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