Is patience a desirable leadership trait?

Monica Diaz (@monedays) asked this question recently on Linked In.  While my immediate response was absolutely, I think it’s important for us to be mindful of whether we are being patient for a higher purpose, or using the veneer of patience as a disguise for avoidance.

Here are a few examples I could come up with for when patience is an act of leadership and when it isn’t.

I would love for you to add to the list.

Patience IS an act of leadership when…

…you are patient wth people as they learn and go through the often difficult work of putting into practice what they are learning.

…you are patient enough to allow for people to stumble and even fail on occassion on their way to success, rather than expecting them to get everything right the first time.

…you are patient enough to allow there to be more questions than answers.

…you are patient enough to encourage people to challenge your thinking rather than expecting them to agree with your point of view because it seems to be faster and easier.

…you are patient with yourself while you learn new things and make new mistakes.

Patience is NOT an act of leadership when…

…you are avoiding making a decision.  For example, using the need for more information or for everyone to agree before you make a tough decision.

…you are tolerating mediocrity (especially when you say you stand for excellence).

…you allow someone to treat you or others badly without addressing it swiftly.  There is a big difference between having patience with people who are exhibiting bad behavior while you help them turn it around and having patience for bad behavior when it happens.

…you are avoiding holding people accountable (perhaps hoping they will self correct).

What do you have to add to either of these lists?

Are you frustrated by people who show up late?  Does it make you crazy when you show up on time, but others don’t, leaving you waiting?

Forget the incentives, the punishments and the gimmicks.

Lead by example instead.

There is a key principal you can use as your guide to taking action that will ensure people show up on time, as well as show up prepared and ready to engage for any meeting.

If you want people to honor your time, then make sure you honor theirs.

Here are three ways you can do that…

1.   Always plan to arrive early AND start on time.

It is a great opportunity to lead by example.  By planning to arrive early you are prepared for unexpected delays that could get in the way of your ability to start on time.  Then honor the people who are there on time by starting as promised.

2.  Design your meetings to produce a specific and meaningful outcome.

When planning your meeting start first by generating a meaningful outcome.  Then ask yourself:  would producing this outcome be worth the total investment of time required for preparation and participation from all involved?

When you can answer “yes” to this question, it’s time to design how the meeting will go – what most people call the agenda.

Keep in mind that an agenda is much more than a check list of topics to cover.  It is your chosen pathway to achieving your intended outcome.  Therefore, only include those topics or questions on the agenda that are relevant to that outcome.

Consider this…If the intended outcome is important to those you invite they are more likely to show up on time, not to mention actually want to be there and show up prepared.

3.  Design your meetings to end at least 15 minutes early (per hour of meeting time).

When you design for an outcome you may find you need to be flexible with the agenda to ensure you achieve the intended outcome.  For example, a topic may take longer than you expect, or you may identify something that needs to be covered in the course of conversation that you did not anticipate.

By including this buffer time you allow the conversation to go where it needs to in order to produce the outcome, rather than having to force your way through the agenda items just to stay on time.

If you end early you have just given people the gift of time.  I have never had anyone complain when I have ended early.  In fact, typically people are very appreciative.

Of course, you may still need more time than you planned for to achieve the intended outcome.  Yet even if you need to schedule a follow up, you will have made progress toward a worthy goal.

Step up and become known as someone who orchestrates conversations that matter and meetings that work.  If you do, the people you invite will want to be there and they are not going to want to be late.

What other simple ways can you think of to implement this principle?  Or do you think the incentives, punishments and gimmicks are a better way to go?

Have an important meeting coming up? Make it worth the investment! Contact Susan for more information about how she can support you in designing and/or facilitating an engaging, productive and satisfying experience.

Is there someone who has believed in you even when you have gone through the dark days of self doubt?

Is there anyone in your life who listens for the best in you even when you are at your worst? They might even be tough on you, not out of judgement, but because they know who you really are and are calling for you to be and do your best at all times.

Do you have someone you call on your best days and feel free to unabashedly boast about your most recent accomplishment, big or small.  You call them because you know they not only want to celebrate your wins with you, but feel joy when you do.  And they know, perhaps better than anyone, what the accomplishment means to you in terms of what you had to do and who you had to be to make it happen.

If you have one person who provides any one of the above for you, you are very fortunate.  While I am lucky to have a few champions in my corner, there is one person who stands out for me in this regard: Rich Largman,  For over 15 years he has been a dear friend, a trusted colleague, and one of my favorite people with whom to collaborate.  He is also my coach.

I have dubbed him a “muse for magnificence”.  Rarely have I met anyone who so generously listens for the absolute best in everyone.  He has a talent for helping people get in touch with and choose to act based on the best in themselves.  It is a key to his excellence as a coach and the quality of his friendships.

While I have the good fortune to have Rich in my inner circle, it is important to note, however, that how he relates to me is not reserved for me or just the “special” people in his life. It is who he chooses to be for everyone.  If there was such a thing as a superpower when it comes to leadership this would be his.

Yet consider being a “muse for magnificence” is an incredibly potent skill anyone can learn.

Taking a stand for someone in this way is perhaps one of the most powerful acts of leadership of all if you wish to cultivate leadership in others.

It is one of those “simple, but not easy” things to do for most of us.  Yet with commitment and practice it can not only be learned, but mastered.

What about you?

Do you have a “muse for magnificence”? If so, what do they uniquely provide for you that brings out your personal best?

Are you a “muse for magnificence” for others?  If so, what guidance can you provide in helping others to become one too?

A recent experiment with my internet/phone service providers left me pondering this question.

Over the last few month’s I hit the end of my rope with persistent yet intermittent internet and phone issues with both AT&T and Comcast.  I have been having issues for over 2 years.  It has been costly in many ways as well as frustrating and at times embarrassing.

Until recently I was using Vonage for phone service, with AT&T internet in my office and Comcast in my home.  But after literally years of getting caught between the two providers passing the buck back and forth I decided to make a change.  Since my issues were intermittent and it wasn’t just phone issues, I did not believe it was Vonage despite both AT&T and Comcast insisting it was.  Yet that was always their easy “out” which left me with no where to turn.

So in desperation the only thing I could think of was to create a “faceoff” between AT&T and Comcast. 

I changed my phone service at both locations to AT&T and Comcast, respectively.  Now there was no one else to blame.  Not surprisingly the service issues continued on both the internet and the phones in both locations.  (Vonage, you have finally been exonerated and I miss having your awesome phone service!)

My plan was to see which service fixed the issues and I would choose one of them for both locations based on which one came through and finally fixed the problem.  It’s been a 4 month process and  it now appears both services are FINALLY working as promised.  Although based on the past I am only cautiously optimistic.  Time will tell.

Getting here, however, was an unimaginably painful and time consuming experience in navigating the labyrinth of the companies’ customer service operations.

The incredibly frustrating chain of events – the calls, the dropped balls, the failure to document calls, the numerous tech visits being told nothing was wrong, the “passing the buck”, the laziness and/or incompetence in some cases, the failure to follow through on promises, and the occasional nasty customer service agent – are case studies in the worst ever customer service.

So while both services are now working, I wish I could now choose a third provider because my customer service with both companies has been abysmal. 

Since that is not an option I will leave well enough alone.  As small business owners this has affected my husband and I significantly, especially in terms of time taken away from work.  Comcast and AT&T you now have a hostage for a customer who will leave when we are certain there is a viable alternative.

With the economic meltdown the question of how big is “too big to fail” was debated.  The question I am left with from this experience is how big is “too big to be able to serve”?

With both companies I dealt with people who were very professional, helpful and competent, as well as people who were irresponsible, lazy, nasty, and/or incompetent.  That is perhaps true wherever you go.

I also understand the systems themselves are complex, problems are not always easy to solve, and when you add third party options it can make things more complex and even less clear.  I don’t expect magic wands, or resolution to be simple or easy all the time.  I even expect to work right along with my service providers to troubleshoot the problems knowing I may find out it is indeed a problem on my end.

Yet I do expect a service provider to own the problem and work with me to solve it.

The biggest issue of all in both companies seems to be a system that thwarts personal responsibility and accountability to the customer at every turn.  Every time I called I was forced to talk to a new person.  Notes on my account were rarely sufficient to help the next person if there were notes at all.  I had to start over so many times I started thinking I should just start making recordings.

There was never one individual who tracked my problem from beginning to end. I was caught in loops of seemingly never ending hand offs, sometimes going in circles.  Because I didn’t know these companies’ language, processes or organizational structures, miscommunication and misunderstanding was rampant.

When I tried to escalate on a number of occasions the phone magically dropped the call more than once.  Other times I was told a supervisor was unavailable.  When I did get to the “next level up” I often felt like I was being handled rather than heard.  Ranting got better responsiveness than rational conversations to my dismay.

As I reflect on my experience here are my initial thoughts on whether a company can become too big to serve.

I don’t think it is an issue of size, but rather an issue of mechanizing human interaction to the point where…

…scripts replace effective 2 way communication;

…intelligence is stamped out by procedures; and

…personal responsibility becomes irrelevant because there’s always someone you not only can, but are expected to pass the problem along to with no expectation of following up.

Your system is broken when…

…the only person who owns the customer’s problem is the customer

…the customer is forced to learn your language and processes just to survive their interactions and finds they often knows them better than your employees.

If you , Comcast and AT&T, or any big company is going to step up your customer service, it’s time to stop trying to fix a human system with a machine based model in the never ending quest for maximizing efficiency.  It is not working.  The alternative is start reinventing your organizations to help employees and customers alike deal effectively with the inherent complexity and inevitable breakdowns.

You have some great people working for you Comcast and AT&T and they appear to be drowning in a sea of mediocrity perpetuated by flaws in your support systems. Please help those people so they can help us.

We really are in this together, or at least we should be...

What do you think – can a company become too big to serve?

P.S.  I tweeted in frustration about Comcast and got a near immediate response.  Despite the lack of “evidence” documented in their system that I deserved some compensation for my trouble,  I was issued a refund for 2 months of service with an e-mail to a specific person I can contact if I have any more problems. Hmmmm

If you consider the teams you have been part of it is likely you could easily assess which were high performing and which were dysfunctional.  As with anything involving human relationships there are a multitude of dysfunctions possible.

However, there is one distinction I have consistently used to help turn dysfunctional teams around.  And when used as the foundation for forming a new team it can get you on a fast track to high performance.

That distinction is the difference between a TEAM and a COMMITTEE.

First of all, the belief that people know what these terms mean often causes leaders to shortchange the process of setting clear, appropriate and shared expectations of the participants and the goals of any group assembled.

Unfortunately because so many have experienced “death by committee” – those painful experiences of meeting over time with a group that produces little and drains your time and energy – some have started replacing the label “committee” with “team” when forming new groups.

As you can imagine that does little to change the dysfunctional dynamics.  In fact it often makes things worse because expectations have been raised without changing the approach or practices applied.

So if you find yourself on a dysfunctional team, or just want to get a new team off to a great start, ask yourself the following 3 questions.

You may discover that your team is nothing more than a committee in disguise.  If so, now you’ll know exactly how to correct course.

1.  What have the members committed to?

If you are being invited or assigned to a committee, chances are you are there to represent some constituency group(s).  While you may want to be on the committee and participate fully, your primary commitment is to the people and interests you represent rather than the committee itself.  Your primary responsibilities are likely to provide input and to be a conduit of communication back to those you represent.  While the committee may have a goal, the committee leaders do not typically require you to personally own achieving that goal.  You simply are there to do your part.

Teamwork on the other hand, especially high performance teamwork, requires a different kind and level of commitment.  It requires that every individual is committed to the same shared goal.  The team goal becomes as important as the commitments you have to any other group(s) you represent.

As an individual team member you commit to owning the result and doing whatever it takes, including more than “your part” when that is necessary to deliver on the shared goal.  High performance teams are distinctive in that the individual team members have an “all in” commitment.

Committee members represent people, groups and interests outside of the group.  They are committed to participating vs. promising a result.  Team members on the other hand are committed to the shared goal of the team and promise to be accountable for the end result being delivered and often implemented.

Committee members participate and represent; team members promise and deliver on a shared goal.

2.  What level of participation was requested and required from the members to succeed?

Being assigned to or volunteering to participate on a committee vs. choosing to be a fully contributing team member call for very different behaviors.

The former only requires that you show up and do your part.  The latter demands you take whatever action is required in service of the shared goal.

When on a committee it can even be easy to get away with not doing what you said you would or doing it poorly.  It can be very frustrating to the few who do the work, but unfortunately the level of agreement and commitment necessary to hold someone accountable is more often than not too weak.  When you choose to be part of a team, however, you can expect to be held accountable.

Note that just because you may be assigned to a team doesn’t mean you still can’t choose how you will participate.

Grudging compliance as an individual may be tolerated and get you by on a committee, but it will likely undermine your credibility and the effectiveness of a team.  Also, putting the interests of the group(s) you represent outside of the team ahead of the shared goal of the team will get in the way as well.  If you can’t honestly find a way to do the right thing for the team then you may not belong on the team.  Hidden agendas have no place on a team.

Volunteering isn’t necessarily choosing to fully participate either.  People volunteer for lots of reasons.  Sometimes there is a genuine commitment to contribute and/or represent others, while other times the reason is more self serving or politically motivated.

In the end though, it doesn’t matter why you volunteered.  If a team is counting on you for a level of commitment and participation beyond what you are willing or able to give then you have by default chosen not to be a team member whether you show up or not.

If you are on a team, you owe it to your team members to authentically choose to be a fully participating member of that team or take yourself out.

3.  How do the members relate to decisions?

Building consensus is the most common way for committees to make decisions.  This essential means the members vote and majority rules.  The “building” part is about getting enough people to agree with you so the vote swings your way.

While it seems fair this common decision making practice has unintended consequences.  The people who are not in the majority are disenfranchised.  If you are one of the ones who voted the other way. when someone asks “why did your committee decide that?” your response will likely be something akin to “I didn’t, “they did”.

Have you ever tried to implement a committee decision that was based on a close vote?  It can be a lot like swimming against the tide!

Consensus may work for some committees, but it rarely works for a team.  Team members must not only own the shared goal; they must own the decisions made in service of that goal.  I often ask team members to explicitly commit to following through on the decisions of the team as though they made the decisions themselves.

Teams members must commit to aligning, not voting or they risk the success of the team.  That includes situations in which the team member makes the decision on behalf of the team.  If you find you can’t get behind the prevailing decision you continue a dialogue until you get whatever you need addressed to choose to get behind the decision, even if it is not the decision you would have made if it were up to you.

Committee members vote. Team members choose to align.

Consider one of the dysfunctional teams you either have been on or are a part of now.  Is your team a committee in disguise?  If so, can you apply this distinction to diagnose the problem and get your team on track?

Speaking up can be a very simple yet potent act of leadership.

Unfortunately just because you speak up doesn’t mean you will be heard.

Sometimes what you have to say lands on “deaf ears”. Perhaps the person you most want to listen doesn’t really want to hear what you have to say or has a blind spot you just can’t seem to get past.  Maybe you will get a reaction you don’t expect or even one you feared.

It’s also possible that despite your best intentions your communication will miss the mark.  Of course you don’t intend to communicate poorly, especially not when you have to muster up the courage to do so.  You may even invest time to choose your words carefully and still miss the mark.

Communication can be messy and unpredictable though which is why speaking up about things that really matter to you often takes courage.  Nonetheless, as the speaker it is your responsibility to get your message “across the bridge”, ensuring that the message you intend to communicate is received.

If you have something important to say here are 3 keys to ensuring you will BOTH be heard AND make the difference you intend to make.

1. Be Aware of Your True Motive

Are you really using this as an opportunity to make a difference?  For example, are you speaking up to challenge the thinking about an issue or decision and provoke constructive conversation or are you aiming to prove your point?  If you are authentically interested in other points of view on the subject, open to learning, and perhaps even changing your mind about the subject at hand, chances are your challenge will make a difference for everyone involved.

If, however, you think you are right, feel the need for others to agree with you, and/or will only be satisfied with your thinking being validated proceed with caution. After all if you are right there is only one outcome for the listener possible – to be wrong.  If your intent in speaking up is to call someone out on something such as bad behavior then this may be the way to go.  But if your intent is to cause productive dialogue you may have work to do before you are ready to speak up to make the desired impact.

If it’s an idea or possibility are you looking for approval, do you want honest feedback, or are you perhaps ready and willing to take a stand intending that others follow your lead?

The key is to first make sure you are clear about your intention and purpose for speaking up.  Only then can you prepare for how to best proceed.

2.  Think About Your Approach Given the Level of Trust in the Relationship(s)

Even the best of intentions can be misread when trust is weak.   Choose your time, place and method according to the level of trust present.  For example, publicly challenging someone’s thinking in front of their boss when they don’t trust you or even their boss is not likely to go well.  In general, the greater the degree of trust among those involved, the less cautious you will need to be.

The key here is to be honest with yourself about the current state of the relationship so you can care for both the relationship and the outcome in the process.  This is particularly essential if you are committed to creating a win-win outcome.

If it’s an idea or a possibility it is just as important to consider the current state of your relationship.  What is exciting for you could provoke a negative response in others.  For example, speaking up about an idea to someone who is competing with you for a position or a boss who feels threatened by you could backfire.  Share your dreams only with those who you can trust to care for your dreams.  Once you are standing strong and ready to move from idea to action could be a better time to speak up to those who could potentially speak or act in a way that undermines your confidence or thwarts your intentions.

3. Go for Progress, Not Perfection

Communication is inherently messy.  A clue that you are seeking perfection is when you find yourself over analyzing and/or playing the same conversation over and over in your mind hoping you will find the way to say things just right.  Another sign is procrastination.

You can’t control what people hear or how they interpret what you say.  Of course, some people are more masterful at communicating than others.  Just don’t wait until you feel you can claim mastery or perfect timing before you act.  You can only learn to communicate better by communicating!

The key is to take action based on your commitments and allow your communication to be guided by your intentions and purpose (i.e., your “why”)  You may screw up or get a completely unexpected reaction.  A setback may not feel like progress, but it is more often than not just a hurdle you could only see because you were willing to act.  If that happens all there is to do is to re-presence your “why” and choose your next action accordingly.

Remember…

Speaking up as an act of leadership isn’t about what you have to say, about being heard, or even about being understood.  It is about the difference you want to make by speaking up.

Sure, speaking up may be risky.  It may require courage to face your fear or step out of your comfort zone.  But don’t let that stop you.  We need you to lead!

“We are a different class than the janitors.  We have to run for office.  We get attacked by our opponents…”  SEN. Gary Siplin, Press Journal, March 25, 2012

This comment was in response to a bill that would require legislators to pay the same healthcare premiums as other FL state employees.  Siplin, along with other FL State legislators including SEN. Ellen Bogdanoff, SEN. Mike Bennett, and SEN. Evelyn Lynn spoke out against the bill.  It was a rare moment of bipartisan agreement.  Unfortunately what they agreed on is “we” are not like “them” and as such deserve special consideration.

Some might argue the issue is about fairness.  After all, the Senators and the Janitors are both state employees and as such shouldn’t they be treated the same, at least when it comes to basic needs benefits?

On the other hand their contributions, as well as the demands of their jobs, are indeed very different.  So differences in compensation, of which benefits is a component, could be justifiable.

Yet the bigger issue here lies in the beliefs that underlie the arguments of these senators.

As a leaders you must be mindful of the beliefs informing your choices because your choices speak volumes about what and who you really care about.

Because they have the power to choose for themselves by voting on this bill, people are watching to see whether they will vote in their own self interests.  After all, FL state employees (and millions of Americans) did not have choice of whether or not to pay more for their health care benefits.  The choice was made for them.

While I suspect Siplin did not intend to convey his point so crassly and might even have been misquoted, you can’t hide your beliefs.  When any leader, especially our elected officials, sees themselves as a class above those who are counting on their leadership, their ability lead effectively is in jeopardy.  Even if Siplin meant to say “different case” rather than “different class”, his words would be less offensive, but not necessarily indicate a different belief.

People may follow your orders when you have positional power over them, but they can always choose whether or not to follow your lead.

The moment you think you are better than those you lead in any way, you run the risk of degrading trust in you and your leadership.

Siplin’s poor choice of words put his beliefs on loudspeaker and time will tell what the consequences will be for him.    Yet even if you mind your manners by saying all the right words in just the right way, if you want to be an effective leader it behooves you to make sure you mind your beliefs.

Bringing consciousness to what you truly believe will ensure your walk aligns with your talk. And if you want to make sure you stay in touch with the people you lead you may just have to challenge some of the things you believe about you, about them. and the difference between you.

Should FL Senators be paying the same as everyone else? 

Personally I wish they would, not because it is a good move politically, but because they believe we are all in this together and are willing to forgo their power to choose in their own best interests.  We could use a lot more humility from our elected officials.

What do you think?

Image by Howard Lake

Is there something you have been wanting to speak up about?

It could be to right a perceived wrong, to stick up for someone or even for yourself, to say the thing everyone is talking about behind the scenes but no one is willing to talk about publicly, or even an idea you have a burning desire to express or pursue.

In the moment you feel compelled to speak up it often feels risky, and perhaps even a bit scary, to do so.

Challenging or questioning something or someone, even when it is for an important reason, is often not easy to do.  It can be very uncomfortable.  For some just raising their hand to share an opinion in a group larger than 2 is an action that requires tremendous courage.

Expressing a possibility or an idea, no matter how excited you are about it, could be met with criticism or laughter or whatever response you fear most might be provoked.

When courage is required consider it may just be a sign this is an opportunity for you to lead.  

It may even be your inner guidance system compelling you to lead right here, right now.

Of course there are a lot of very valid reasons for not speaking up.  You may not feel it is worth the risk.  Perhaps others have tried before you and it didn’t end well or you don’t really believe that by speaking up you will make any difference.  You may have already tried and failed.  Then there is the allure of the perceived safety of silence.

Yet if you are even thinking about whether to speak up about something or not chances are you have a choice to make.  Will you speak up or not? 

Will you choose to be A leader in this situation even if you are not THE leader?

Will you risk facing whatever you fear for the sake of the difference you want to make and whatever you are committed to for the future?

Speaking up as an act of leadership isn’t about what you have to say, about being heard, or even about being understood.  It is about the difference you want to make by speaking up.

The choice is up to you.  What are you willing to speak up about to make a difference in what matters most to you?

Over the last year I have been migrating to Apple products from PC’s and a Blackberry.  I love them all, and will never go back. Yet it has nonetheless been frustrating to make the change. It’s a daily exercise in “who moved my cheese”.

Of all the things I have had to adapt to though, the one that remains the most frustrating is the spell checker on my iPhone/iPad. 

Now I am clear I am not the only one (just google “autocorrect”). However, knowing that doesn’t make it any less frustrating. Here is a great example:

Photo by Benjamin Forrest

It can be very funny of course, but it can also get in the way of productivity and result in sending embarrassing messages you only realize you sent after the fact.

I’ve been thinking to myself lately: so what is the big deal? 

I tried turning it off for a while, but I seem to need a spell checker.  So I turned it back on.  I reasoned it just works differently than I expect so get over it and adapt because your typing is less than accurate!

And then I realized what makes me so crazy: the way the spell checker is designed, it assumes I am wrong and it is right. 

You have to actually reject the suggested correction. If you just press space, it is adopted.  If all I did was press enter or space in the above example my message would say “traps hobos”. It is a design flaw in my opinion because it defies human nature! After all, doesn’t Apple know human beings are wired to want to be right?

Now of course I know it’s not personal!  It is however a context that is hard to adapt to. It’s not natural, at least not for many of us.

This observation had me pause to reflect on what it is like to be told you are wrong by another person; when it is a person who is repeatedly saying in various ways that “you’re wrong”, rather than a computer.

The spell checker is relentless. Yet while it is irritating, it is just doing what it is programmed to do.  It’s behavior is predictable and it has nothing to do with me.  I get to choose to turn it on or turn it off.  I can also seek an alternative.

On the other hand, when a person repeatedly tells you that you are wrong, it can be much more than irritating. 

It is likely to occur as personal. It can be demeaning, discouraging, or deflating. The experience, if repeated often enough, can even do a number on your self esteem.  What’s worse is that you can can end up feeling powerless because you feel like you don’t have a choice.  And there is no switch you can flip to make it go away.

I have been coaching a client who has been on the other end of someone relentlessly finding fault with everything she does.  She is finally embracing that, like the annoying spell checker, it may just be simply how this person is programmed and has nothing to do with her.  And she is aware she does have choices to make even though it sometimes doesn’t feel that way.

She may not be able to “reprogram” the person, but she has been working to “reprogram” the relationship and her reactions by making new choices about how she will interact. For example, she has been speaking up about what she will and will not tolerate. She has stopped trying to defend herself. There may not be a simple switch you can flip to change someone elses behavior, but there is always a choice you can make to empower yourself.

Leaders choose.  If you want to lead, you must learn to choose no matter what the circumstance. If you make a choice and it does not turn out the way you hoped, all there is to do is learn from it and make another choice.

Do you know someone who has a hard time receiving? It could be anything in particular – a compliment, a gift, a favor, etc.  Maybe you are one of those people.

There are 3 reasons I have observed in myself and others for feeling discomfort when it comes to receiving.

Being aware of how each of these factors may be at play can free you up to receive as well as support others in doing so.  It can also help you be a better giver.

1.  Your Personal Context for Receiving

I was reading a post from Erin Schreyer titled Are You Giving, Taking… or Stealing. Essentially Erin makes the point that at some point taking can cross the line into stealing even when what is being given is free.

She got me thinking about the big difference between taking and receiving. I started wondering if, for those who have trouble receiving, there could be a belief that these are the same thing. Clearly they are not, but your beliefs don’t always follow logic.

In fact you may not even realize you have a specific belief that is in the way of being able to receive the generosity of others with grace and ease.

Your belief may or may not have to do with feeling like in receiving you are taking something that doesn’t belong to you.  That is of course just one possibility.

Maybe you were told you were selfish or undeserving at some point in your life and it stuck to you as though it were the truth about you.  Perhaps you watched as the people you looked up to deflected compliments or denied gifts with the equivalent of “you shouldn’t have” in the name of being polite.  Maybe you learned you shouldn’t accept gifts because it would obligate you to someday offer something in return as though a gift is just a way of manipulating you into owing them something.

If you are consistently challenged with receiving generosity from another (or even asking for help or support of any kind) it may be time consider what is in the way.

Try asking yourself this question: What do I fear would be true about me or them (or worry others will think of me) if I accepted a “gift” in any of it’s forms without resistance or qualification?

2.  Your Relationship with the Giver

If you already know or sense there are issues in your relationship with the giver, those issues will likely color your experience of receiving from them. In these situations it may be a good idea to consider if your experience with receiving in this instance may be a symptom of an issue in your relationship rather than with your inability to openly and authentically receive.

A good question to ask yourself is: how are my feelings and interpretations of this person and our relationship affecting my experience in being given to by this person?

3.  The Givers Intention

Not all gifts come without strings attached.  On the surface the giving gesture may seem like an act of appreciation or generosity.  But if it somehow doesn’t really feel like a gift or an act of true generosity, there may be a hidden motive or expectation of something in return.

In fact, if that is the case it isn’t a gift at all.  It is a form of manipulation.  In these situations it is no wonder you would feel uncomfortable receiving because in doing so you are making an agreement you may not want to make.

If such a situation arises consider it may behoove you to speak up if your relationship with that person is important to you.

You may not want to address your feelings then and there, especially in front of others as this kind if conversation is a private one.  You may not want to address it all if you don’t trust the individual or you don’t see this person having enough influence over your future to make it worth the risk of a potentially difficult conversation.

Either way make sure you choose based on how you value the relationship and your commitments rather, than your fears.

And if you do speak up remember to go in with an open mind because your interpretation of their motive may not be their reality.  Your new awareness can be a great way to open an important and constructive conversation, but remember you are not the only person with feelings and beliefs in this equation.

Consider this…

None of us would get along in this world without the love and support of others.  To the extent that you are limiting the ability of others to give to you doesn’t just rob them of the joy of giving.  It may actually be stealing away your personal success and satisfaction in life.  And the extent to you experience discomfort with receiving from a particular person is an opportunity to observe and take action to make that relationship better.

So what about you – how well do you receive?