Care and candour ? the business benefits

May 14th, 2012?????? no comments???

Have you been in a meeting where a behaviour by a colleague, employee or leader needed to be addressed? Have you worked with a team where everybody went through the motions and continued to avoid surfacing an issue until it eventually became an undiscussable?

Speaking with care and candour involves showing care and respect for the person while at the same time being absolutely clear on the issues. Speaking with true and respectful candour is not criticism; it?s about focusing on the issue and not the person. It?s communicating authentically without doing any damage.

Examples

Here are three typical examples of issues that need to be addressed the workplace:

1. One of your colleagues is working with you on a project. Your colleague is missing deadlines that?s impacting other areas.
How would you respond and what would you say?

2. One of your employees is suffering from depression and not performing well.
How would you respond and what would you say?

3. One of the members of the board seems to be dominating the conversation and shutting people out.
How would you respond and what would you say?

Real costs

There are real costs associated with not speaking with care and candour: avoiding issues becomes time-consuming, it results in lower productivity and morale, deadlines are missed, decisions take longer. And if the practice continues, it can impact negatively on financial returns.

Requirements

In order for a culture of openness to thrive within an organization, the leadership needs to:

1. Encourage a culture of openness by communicating the benefits and making the practice part of each employee?s PDP or personal development plan

2. Model the behaviours by making the practice visible in meetings and one-to-one discussions

3. Encourage employees to speak with care and candour by asking them to share what?s really on their minds, in other words, to share the other 10%

Benefits

Once the leaders give themselves and others permission to speak with care and candour, significant benefits occur:

1. A culture of openness, honesty and respect begins to take root

2. Collaboration and engagement improves

3. Productivity and morale improves

4. Clearer decisions are made leading to better results

And guess what? You won?t have to drag yourself to that meeting anymore. Your energy has returned. The person you were avoiding hasn?t gone away. You decided to address the issue with that person with care and candour, and you were surprised by the positive outcome.

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