Tal Ben-Shahar and Angus Ridgway’s SHARP model of leadership looks at Performance Multiplier 4: RELATIONSHIPS
Relationships cultivated at work tilt the balance towards successful leadership. When we interact positively with others, levels of oxytocin ‘tend and befriend hormone’ go up, and levels of cortisol ‘fight or flight hormone’ go down. There is a physiological benefit to creating these positive interactions.
Employee recognition is indispensable for high performance and productivity as shown by Tom Rath and Donald Clifton in their book ‘How Full is your Bucket’.
“Employees want to matter”. When they are ignored at work they lose interest, motivation drops, and level of disengagement spikes. Being too busy as a leader to acknowledge your employees is shooting yourself in the foot. “When you appreciate the good, the good appreciates”
A leader’s response to positive events outweighs his/her response to negative events. It predicts relationship success better.
The authors offer a construct. Let us say an employee presents a proposal at work. How do you tend to respond?
Active Constructive Response ACR
You engage in active listening, attend deeply, and reflect the energy of the person, emotions and thoughts. Use the strengths based approach, highlighting the others’ strengths. The employee feels acknowledged and validated. This is the most desirable response. You are “building positive capacity so that the relationship can weather negative events”.
Passive Constructive Response PCR
You briefly recognize the work of the employee with a quick nod and a half smile, without making the time to weigh in its merits or any other aspects. The employee feels minimized and brushed aside summarily.
Active Destructive Response ADR
You offer feedback that is critical and harmful without showcasing any positive aspects of the work, nor giving the other person a chance to explain or defend. You are short and curt. The employee feels hurt, denigrated and belittled.
Passive Destructive Response PDR
You avoid eye contact, ignore the other’s work or presence, and move on to others’ ideas quickly. The employee feels humiliated, dismissed and invalidated. It is enervating and draining. This is the most undesirable response.
When more members feel comfortable to make mistakes and fail they are more likely to improve. Create a psychologically safe environment for the employees. Leaders themselves need to receive feedback from their employees to be able to improve their own performance. Daniel Goleman coined the phrase ‘The CEO Disease’ to describe a leader who is out of touch with how he shows up; there is a lack of candid feedback. Again, by creating a psychologically safe environment this can be prevented “As leaders, learn to fail, or fail to learn!”
Amy Edmondson of Harvard Business School says in today’s knowledge economy, “Psychological Safety requires leaders who are willing to ask for forgiveness.”
3 simple things leaders can do to foster psychological safety:
– Frame the task at hand as a learning problem not an execution problem
– Acknowledge your own imperfection
– Model curiosity
“ACR amplifies positivity while psychological safety contributes to authenticity.”
Practice what you preach. What is your Say: Do ratio? If you bring it closer to 1:1 it increases your level of integrity. Be the leader who leads by example!