How Do I Deal with Low Performers on My Team?
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I merial Walkers, and this is coaching real leaders, part of the H V R podcast network. I'm a long time executive coach who works with highly successful leaders who've hit a bump in the road. My job is to help them get over that month by clarifying their goals and figuring out a way to reach them so that hopefully they can lead with a little more ease.

I typically work with clients over the course of several months, but on this show, we have a one time coaching meeting focusing on a specific leadership chAllenge they are facing. Today's guess this someone will call mode to protect his confidential. He's based in the middle east and manages a client facing team dispersed across multiple locations. His team has doubled in size in the last few years, and IT hasn't always been easy before .

being promoted to director. When I was a project manager, I wasn't really having direct reports. Maybe this was the main chAllenge when I came being at the active and something related to the chAllenges, maybe that when I got promoted, IT was during the covent.

The turn lover was absolutely high. Also, while I was just getting promoted and i'm stopping to work how i'm going to manage the team, I was just getting a lot of people are resigning and I need to to maintain them. So actually, I lost half of my team in actually a couple of months, and I was the biggest struggle for me at that time.

Moi van's steadily at his company and has performed well. He made the shift, his current director level role during a Timothy st. time. But he's also running into other chAllenges that he didn't expect.

Usually, if you are having diversity team from junior to senior employees, your expectation is always that you need to give a hand for the junior team. And you trust the senior once that they know the job, they know how to do IT. You trust their decisions.

But when I came to reality, it's totally the opposite. I've seen a lot of incidents happened and unfortunate i'm struggling with managing the senior imprisons my team. We started the .

conversation there by looking deeper at how exactly he was struggling with more senior members of his team versus the more junior members and how the impact of this dynamics was playing out. Let's dive in.

It's a struggle because I feel it's unfAiling for my team because they know each other and they know how each project within the company within our region is smoothly and is a taxi or not.

So when they hear about scallions that are happening with senior empire is what they are doing in their projects and they are achieving their milestones, you are getting the questions from the juniors, why are not promoting me or giving me? I'm doing Better people. They started to compare and it's affecting that.

I would say the team spirit, that's one of the things. The other thing, I don't have a successive. And for me, I think this is a thing because if i'm not having a successive, I don't feel that I did my job or I didn't deliver the message as expected and trying not to be blaming myself. But i'm keeping myself accountable at the end that at certain points I need to make sure that there is someone to manage the team for certain time or even to release one or two the junior project managers to be direct reports to one of these seniors, which is until now, i'm not able to give the Green light OK.

What would make you feel like you can give the screen light .

if I got the trust from them, if I feel that they are accountable, if I feel that they are able to manage their projects as expected? Without, I wouldn't say advice, it's not the Normal advice really know it's was talking is sometimes about basics that IT shouldn't be going this way. It's meanwhile trusts.

right? And IT sounds like the trust for you would come if you could see that they are performing, delivering their projects as expected. yes. okay. So I heard you say that your hope would be that the senior level folks on your team that they could be accountable to what they need to be doing. So my question for you is what role have you been playing in holding them accountable?

I'm having my one one meeting with all the team. I'm trying to be updated with the project progress. I am asking them about any chAllenges. Try not to get direct with the day to day interaction, but just as an oversight on the whole project.

That was that moving, if any, chAllenges, especially if you know that, for example, they are managing a new country, that they are not familiar rules, the regulations and they might be looking for some guidance. I can give such thing. But again, if they are coming up with a lot of issues without coming with a solution, that's one of the flags.

I would say that they are not being accountant if they are having issues that wasn't be identified and IT was just flag when I came an official location, that's a flag for me that they are not getting account to. If the rest of the team working with them, they are struggling. And i'm getting some concerns from css functional departments about either responsiveness or in the way of communication or the support that they are expecting from project. It's a flagged .

for accountability. okay. So when these things happen, let's just take you know they come up with issues but no solution or you're hearing complaints from cross unction groups about lack of responsiveness.

And I hear you when you say it's a lack of accountability. What i'm curious about is what is IT that you are doing? Is their manager when these things .

happen from going to take an example here for such a situation. So one of them was just coming with big experience. He wasn't director actually, but he was looking for a job and he applied for a project manager.

I knew that when I was interviewing game, I would had this discussion that wouldn't you see that it's going to be a chAllenge that you are down in reding to level from what you had previously? You have a lot of direct reports, and he told me, and i'm looking for the new chAllenges and i'm open to take the letter. But what happened when he joined and we started working together, he had a lot of concerns.

Maybe it's the company culture, maybe how we are running the business. IT looks different from what he has experience. Ed on different companies is expectation that we should be chAllenging each other, that this is something healthy for the work, but we don't have this kind of interactions.

And so he was always, always coming with some guidance or recommendations. But at certain point, IT became that they are not accepting this kind of recommendations. And at the beginning, I just thought it's benie and you will just try to move on because you need to build the relations at the report was the with the team that you are working with.

But these kind of concerns started to raise from different people. And I had to had this discussion at certain point, trying to calm him down and to focus on the work itself, rather than focusing on the people and what they are doing. So let's just make the job done and everyone will be happy. But IT came with a very defensive discussion, I would say. So IT was a thread le for some time, even if i've seen some improvements in this communication internally still on finding struggles with the communication .

with the so no, what do you think you need to do?

I would go for my a way of discussion when IT comes to negative feedback. So Frank is pick, I am not that confrontational person, but I try to deliver the message. And I did IT in way or another.

Not sure if I need to try different strategy to get different outcome, which I think it's must because I cannot do the same and expect different outcome. But with this level of senior, you will feel that might he might be bored a little bit with feeling he lost the the passion. And this is looking for the next step.

You, but again, this is putting me in a chAllenging board because I cannot give someone who is not delivering and he is not getting what is expected from a project. And i'm just rewarding him to give him directly because because that's what is looking for IT IT cannot be this way. I feel that I need to put him this year underneath development grades.

But I think it's going to be very tough discussion to go through with yeah, my big chAllenge with them when and we're having discussion about the forms of about issues is the defensive way he's talking about, the accountability that always when we are talking about an issue happened or a gap, that this issue or gap will be just thrown on someone. Is this one he didn't review IT correctly or this one didn't give me the right information or so at the end, he's not going to say, okay, i'm accountable for that. Maybe um I didn't have this experience having develop. It's not that much long time to have a lot of tough discussions.

So let's take a step back because I want to kind of make sure that I am reflecting back what i'm hearing. I think on the one hand, you have this, you know, how do I drive accountability with these senior level folks, right? And so what IT seems like you've tried to do is when you see something that's not going right, you provide them with some feedback or be a IT might feel a little difficult to do so.

And in one of the examples that you sure that, that sounds like at least with the internal team, there was some difference. There was some changing behavior, but now you're seeing the behavior pop up again. But somewhere else and in those situations, what that means is, I mean, I don't know, was your expectation that when you gave him that feedback, that would be IT, he would be done, he would, you know, make the change and then I would never happen again.

IT didn't happen from the first time. IT took me like one year having these discussions with the different concerns that came from close functional department. Maybe IT was like three, four months ago when we had this discussion and I started our meeting saying that I can see improvement in the way of your communication with the colleagues internally.

What do do you think about that? And he told me at that time, yeah, I tried to follow the other ways in order to get things easier for us. I told them at the end, let's take IT positively.

You try to find other, other ways that works at the end, which that seems right. And he told me, I agree on that. So I tried to deliver.

I just encourage him that you are doing games. And I felt that I was a good message that he was able to digest, and things were moving in a Better way. But again, when they came was the the other way around from the clients. And now they are asking to remove him. So we are talking here about unpleasant to.

More is experiencing what a lot of managers at any level experience the need to have some difficult conversations with those he's managing and to try a shape behavior toward the path that's Better for the organization. Overall, the specifics here of why most employee may or may not be performing is not what's important because those specifics they'll always change depending on who he's dealing with.

But what we can focus on is whether moke can use new ways of handling these situations when they are rise. It's clear that he wants to do a good job here and is self reflective and realizing that even at his senior level, he hasn't had have many of these difficult feedback conversations in the past. I think it's important to know that as much as we might want to, it's not always a given that leaders and managers can help improve someone to behave your performance, especially if they're not coaches.

But what we do have control over is our own behavior and how we approach a situation, both mentally and tactically. Now that we have contacts on moo and what he's specifically struggling with, we can begin to coaching him through this particular staff situation he's dealing with and then end up with some higher level takeaway that he can apply elsewhere. So now you have a decision to make, right? The first is your expectation.

You came in saying, you know, maybe i'm not having the conversation rate with him IT sounds like you are having the conversation. The behavior did change right? There was some improvement, but now the behaviors, negative behavior is happening in other areas and you're getting some negative feedback on your direct report.

So what that means is, you know, it's not completely solved. And if it's not completely solved, what it's gonna require from you is having more feedback conversation. So I think that there is an expectation in your mind that because they are senior, they only need to hear IT once or twice or they shouldn't even be happening.

And what IT is happening, you're giving them the feedback once or twice and then I should just resolve itself. But that's not what's happening in reality. They still have issues. yes. So then the question becomes, how many issues does there need to be for you to make a decision on whether this is a performance management problem or is IT a skill that this person needs to learn that you're gona coach them through .

for what I see? They have the capabilities, but they don't have the passion. That's that's my perception. And I trust my feelings that the answer because i'm dealing with them on daily visitors. I know that if we just focusing giving more time, focusing on the projects you will be able to deliver. But it's a matter of being I should be in a Better place or something like that, you know, which is I cannot just give you what you are looking for without getting what i'm looking for because yeah so it's the .

motivation on there and the commitment .

yeah yeah i'm trying to motivate from my side. I'm trying to keep people motivated. I'm trying not to get them bored because any job at certain time that is you're doing the same. So to find something new and that's what i'm trying to do, but I have a limit. And the other person, they need to do some effort as well.

That's right. It's a two way street.

You can't .

motivate someone who is not open to be motivated exactly. Now I don't know these folks that you are talking to, so I can't assess whether they are open to be motivated or not, but I am curious whether that is a conversation that you've had with them around their level of motivation, in commitment. And as you put a passion for being able to deliver on the competencies that they do have.

I tried to have this discussion when we were talking mainly about the confluences that were coming with the internal team. That was what I mean, focus at that time. But I wasn't talking about motivation because I wasn't expecting, Frankly speaking, at certain point, that i'm going to get back to the same point where i'm getting a client asking to remove him from the project. I was like to get him busy. You know, people, when they are not busy, they lose motivation and this and negative as well, which is something I don't want to be continuous to the other motivated people within the team.

Here's the thing right there is a saying around when you have a team, you have to make sure that imagine that your team is on a bus and the bus is going to certain destination, which is the goals that you're trying to achieve. You've gotten make sure that you have the right people on the bus and then you have to make sure that they're sitting in the right seats.

yes.

And so when you look at your team members, to what extent do you feel like you have the right people on the bus when IT come to senior level team members? And if you have the right people on the bus, to what extent you feel like they're sitting in the right seats, meaning they should be in the senate?

I agree with you. Maybe again, if you're talking about the senior city here. So that means that I need to give more responsibly lit E S.

And delegates other authorities that I I need to give. But how can I do with the current situation that I am having? now? I cannot move with such a decision.

I'm not sure if this is maybe it's a wrong perception that like for example, if I didn't test him for being a lime medicine, in reality he has this experience. You think that he has IT, but I didn't see IT. So shall I say, okay, maybe he's not doing the right thing on project management, but if I give him direct reports, he will be doing good job.

Well, I think it's interesting because you said I agree with moral. I didn't make the assessment.

Yeah, you know what I mean, I mean about I agree about the bus itself.

the bus itself, but you automatically jumped to the your answer, which was your response, which was, yes, I should be able to then delegate more to them and to give them more responsibility assumes that they are the right people on the bus.

okay.

And I don't know one way or the other. You know when IT becomes a performance issue, that's when you started saying him like in order for you to be on this bus, you have to be able to perform at a certain level. And if you are not performing at a certain level, you might not belong on this bus.

And so I think you can automatically jump there, right? The first part is to lay out the expectations. And IT sounds like what you're saying is you've laid out the expectations in terms of skill and competency, and they have that, but they're missing on the commitment and the motivation and the passion and what IT is that they're bringing.

So at what point and again, I don't have any skin in the game. These are just questions to help you think through IT. At what point are you making decisions around whether you have the right senior team or not? Do you feel like you have the right in your team? You OK. So if you don't feel like you have the right senior team, what options do you have in front of you?

They need to shape up. They need to show that they are seniors. I'm trying to work with them on that. But again, maybe the other point here if as we have been talking previously said that my expectation that if i'm sing or giving an advice for one or two times that they should be changing.

So maybe the question is, if they didn't change, do I need to be just more aggressive in my feedback? Is this is the solution or getting to another way of giving a feedback? Because maybe I feel at certain point, I feel maybe i'm not delivering the message in the right way because that's why still they didn't change this attitude. For example, I say, is this because I need to be more aggressive? So that's the only way that they will be listening and considering to change.

And what would that mean to be more aggressive? What would that look like?

Like putting someone on an action plan that I am not going to be easy anymore. They say either i'm getting the results i'm looking for or that at the end story, i'm not that person on Frankie speaking. And I don't feel that this is the easiest way.

It's not sweet, but it's the easy to IT to just okay, i'm i'm i'm having the upper hand here. I will just put an action plan and that IT. So maybe I didn't have this kind of experience before, and that's why I don't want to step within this black hole that I don't know how IT will be what the consequence for such a decision to be taken.

So i'm trying to be patient. I'm trying to to keep the open discussion. But at certain point, maybe i'm i'm not being fair with the team and dealing with with good.

yeah. So I understand, I understand. And there's a couple of things here. Number one is you said, know, should I take a more aggressive approach, which is putting them on an action plan with very clear consequences at such A I can't tell you one where the other, but that is an option, right? That is an option for any manager as is there is an option of coaching them through, which is what IT seems like you have been doing this.

So I think your question is, is IT maybe because i'm not effective in the way that i'm coaching them, therefore, that's why they are not changing. And then your other option is to just do nothing and keep know keep things as is, which I know that's not what you want to do. None of these options are easy.

Yes.

this is the chAllenge of being a manager. This is the part that's not necessarily fun, okay? Because they all can be what can feel like difficult conversations.

So what is understanding what your options are? And in the other is how do you know when you move from one option to another? And I think there's a couple of things that you have to take into consideration.

One is, well, if I keep things going at the way that they're going, at what cost? And am I OK with that? There is a trade.

So if what you are saying is, look, I want to continue coaching them. I don't want na take the more quote and quote aggressive approach of putting them on an action plan. I'm going to continue to work.

I'm going to be patient with them. But in the meantime, I know the rest of the team is starting to feel very frustrated by this. What you're saying is it's OK for the rest of the team to get frustrated because it's worth IT for me to work with this person.

And that's fine as long as that's a choice you're making. But if you're saying, hey, I can afford the rest of my team to lose motivation or to get frustrated or to get, you know, all these things because they're seeing somebody who's not performing a while continue to get rewarded. So i'm gonna now move to the next action with that individual, right, for the sake of my team, or for the sake of the result, for the sake that I need a successor.

So marial can't tell you what those different litters tester, but you have to sort of figure out, you know, at what point do I move to one of the other options OK that more something as a manager you need to come up with? And then you also to look at your company, like what's the process, you know, what's the policy at your company? I'm sure this probably some type of H R.

Policy of what warrants moving somebody to a performance improvement plan or an action plan. Okay, in every companies, a little bit different in that. So this is definitely one area that I would take consult with.

You know, whoever your H. R. Person is to understand like this is even warrant moving to that.

But what I do think is important is for you to recognize because I feel like what you're looking for is how do I make IT a little less uncomfortable? right. And that maybe the this comfort is that you haven't had this experience before.

Yeah IT could be that you've never had this experience before and that's what makes them uncomfortable IT could be that because you're faced with people who are getting defensive that what makes IT uncomfortable. IT could be that, you know, you prefer to coach people along and believe that people can actually change and improve, and you would rather do that and put them into an action plan. So IT goes against your beliefs.

And that's what makes IT uncomfortable. There could be a number of reasons for what makes IT uncomfortable. But the fact is for you, the way you're experiencing IT is uncomfortable and that's okay.

Yeah that means i'm going for that. Maybe this will push me to take an action that if i'm taking IT from a positive way, that I need to find a solution to get comfortable. But i'm not happy being uncomfortable with the situation, right?

I don't know if you'll ever be fully comfortable with IT what you are doing. And you said earlier, you said, look, I trust my feelings around this. You have to look at the facts, which IT seems like you have evidence around where the performances and what's happening. Then there's a certain aspect of, okay, like what do I believe I need to do to move this forward? And IT can't just be because you know you're frustrated.

That's why saying having some metrics, what does the person need to be able to do? What are the expectations regardless of who's in that sea? What do they need to be able to do? And how do they need to lead as a senior person to be in that seat? And then you ask .

us .

what i'm saying, moo, is I think you have. But i'm gna ask again, have you laid out what that means to be successful in the senior positions?

Yes, it's about the our achieving the goals. And we do have clear achievements and kepi eyes that we need to achieve. That was certain kind of quality that we need to be working a specific process. So it's clear how to understand that you are achieving and you are doing a great job.

And do they understand what the expectations are in terms of how they achieve those KPI is meaning the behavioral expectations.

I'm assuming it's yes, I know I shouldn't be an assumption. But again, with the kind of discussion that we had like the concerns that came related to communication with the situation happened with a client that is coming and saying, I need to remove disposal from the project. They understand that they are not doing well OK.

And so again, going back to your choices, when choices to continue to kind of try to coach him, throw IT, right? The other choices took kind of layout and action plan with very clear goals or changes or progress that he has to demonstrate by a particular time. What would make you feel like you need to move from the coaching option to the action plan option? What would be the difference? Rea.

the difference will be the to what we are discussing during the coaching if i'm not getting the results from the coaching. So this means that I need to put an action plan. I'm escalating a moving to the next step that my other standing of moving to an action plan.

So far in the conversation, moo has taken responsibility and really questioned whether he could be doing a Better job as a manager in motivating his teen, especially with members that seem to be missing the mark, which is a great instinct to have to ask, what can I do Better when IT comes to team members that are not performing up to par and when IT comes to having tough conversations? But we reached a moment in this part of the conversation that I thought I was important to highlight that at a certain point, you also have to look at the tradeoffs because difficult feedback conversations are uncomfortable.

Suggesting someone might not be in the right role or that they lacked passion for that role is uncomfortable. The hard part for any leader is to make a decision that is best for the team and the company. Otherwise, you're essentially saying it's more important to stay comfortable than IT is to upset the baLance in your organization.

So while it's always important to think first about what you can do Better to improve a situation, it's also good to remember the overall purpose you serve in your role and whether the current team dynamics are letting you and your team fulfill that purpose. Let's keep that in mind as I circle LED back with moo now to talk about his definition of accountability, until all these things are under the umbrella of driving accountability as the manager of others, holding the team accountable is a big part of your responsibility. And so what does that mean to even the term of holding others accountable? How do you define that for yourself?

Whatever is happening within my team, i'm responsible, and I want to make sure that we are having this mutual agreement about accountability and the level of understanding of responsibility store of the project.

That's why when I was saying up, assuming, yes, because when we were talking about with the team and how they are doing the work, there are some baselines that we understand from responsibility, from accountability toward the projects that IT is not negotiate. IT doesn't need to be discussed. So when sometimes you are discussing with a senior person is a question mark why we are discussing this point, you shall know IT.

We shouldn't come up to this discussion. I should be discussing something totally different. I should be give you another responsibility. That's the kind of discussion, but not going back four or five steps. And we are starting to talk about basics, why you are not responding on time, why you are not shaking the document before you are sending this. And we find that IT has a lot of mistakes, for example, or something like that OK.

And so if the mistakes keep happening or if this sounds like you keep having the you know lower level conversations or the conversations that you don't expect of somebody more senior and you've given them the feedback that the conversation should be happening at a higher level with them. But we keep going back to these very baseline things if that keeps happening over and over and over again and you've given them the feedback in your coaching.

So these are too big. You're telling me you have, right? I'm going to assume you have and IT sounds like you have from what you shared. But again, i'm not in the room.

But let's assume if you've done the feedback and you've done the coaching, you've communicated to them where you expect them to perform and yet they still keep performing at a different level that's not aligned with the seat that they have on the bus. What are your choices at that point? You have three choices, right? The choice is to keep them in the sea on the bus and continue to culture them.

The second choices to move their seat on the bus, put them in a different seat that more aligned with how they're performing. And the third choices, they're not on the bus. Yeah.

if you allow me money, just I want to go back to one step when we were talking about the feedback and when I was also giving the example about the basic, just to clarify, the discussion is still didn't happen OK.

The main focus that mention previously, maybe IT, was me about the communication and the conflict with the ross function department, and we were working on that with so some improvement now with the new situation, with the new incident happened with this project and a lot of investigation, we are going around. And then I figured out a lot of gaps, which I as I was just sharing you, that they are basics that I wasn't expecting to find such file endings in this situation. So that's my point actually.

And what was planning that in this touch business that i'm going to be discussing these new gaps that I found? I feel that he needs to understand that you need to change the way of managing the projects and and dealing with people. So I need to take a decision. That's what I am feeling, that I might be even the good step for me from talking here before were going to an action plan. But i'm not sure if I should be discussing this during the touch base or shall I keep IT for the end of the year discussion only.

okay. You're not gonna my answer because I can't tell you whether to put you know communicate needs improvement now or at the end of the year because that does become much more of a performance review question. IT would be irresponsible of me to give you that type of guidance in our coaching irrespective of what the overall H.

R. Performance to review process is for your particular company, right? So that is something that I definitely think you should discuss internally with whoever you're H.

R. people. okay. That said, I think your responsibility as a manager is to be clear about what the behavior is that you're seeing. So what the feedback is as concretely and specifically as possible, that's number one. And number two, be very clear about what your expectations are.

And so even if it's not, you know saying, oh, you're gonna get a need to improvement or it's in the performance review language to be able to say part of what i'm seeing in terms of your work with X, Y, Z is there's a lack of responsiveness. You're taking a week, two weeks, you know, falling behind in responding. My expectation is over the next couple of months that you improve your responsiveness and that you're responding within period of time.

So that is about clearly stating expectations, which is your responsibility? no. And then the third pieces, how are you going to support him in being able to meet those expectations? And that's where we get into.

Okay, i'm to meet with him weekly. We're gona go over, you know what we discussed this meeting and i'm gonna continue to give him feedback. I'm gna track the progress to see how things are going. So how does that land with you in terms of the question that you had? And then what my responses, how is IT resonating with you?

Well, it's giving me actually come to the more about the discussion because I like the pot that you mention talking about the actions and what are my expectations and that i'm here to support you to meet these expectations. Because as I was talking again with the personality of being a little bit defensive, I need to make sure that he understand that i'm not adjust point finger on him without supporting.

I need to ensure that whatever the message i'm i'm delivering to him, that i'm able to be varied, ted. And that we are having this agreement, mutual agreement, that we will be working on that together. It's not that i'm just going to be the boss.

You just do IT and I will access IT. We will work on that together and let's make the improvement. As I mentioned, maybe this is just giving me the confidence to go with this inactive, and I hope to get what i'm .

looking for. Yeah, and you've mentioned a couple of times that what you want is for your direct report to understand what the expectations are, to understand what IT is that you are saying to him in terms of a feedback, what would you need to ensure for you that he does understand? How could you ensure that there is understanding .

at the end is a smart guy. So if i'm giving clear message because here what i'm talking about, his facts and coming with these facts and putting them on the table saying, so here is what happened with this situation, how we should be done to overcome such a situation.

So if we open all these incidents and we have this kind of discussion that should be setting the expectations for what should be going on for any other tasks is similarly the same way that he needs to if we are coming to this discussion and aging on the preventative or the mitigation plan, not to get such incidents happening again. So we are putting some expectations to the attitude. But in general, IT means that more oversight will be needed and to have more effective time spent on the projects to cover these gaps that are coming.

yeah. And so what I would suggest is in presenting the facts, there's different levels of how another person can respond, right? They can hear you, but because they hear you and they hear the facts and they see the facts, doesn't necessarily mean that they are understanding the facts in the way that you would like them to understand IT, right? When we talk about understanding something IT is the interpretation of what you're presenting.

yes.

and what you want to ensure, what I hear you saying you want to ensure is he understands the situation in the way that you understand the situation so that then there is a mutual agreement or alignment that happens up towards around how to move forward.

So yes, you can lay out the facts, but there are things that you can do to also ensure that he is understanding them in the way that you need him to understand that he's interpreting IT in the way that you need. And the reason why i'm bringing himself because you said, you know, the person tends to get offensive, right? So defensiveness often gets in the way of understanding, doesn't necessarily get in the way of hearing IT gets in the way of understanding.

And so one of the ways, as you can check for understanding, you know, after you've laid everything out and they've responded, so okay, so you know, what are you taking away from this? How are you interpreting this? What do you think the next steps should be? What are you hearing in terms of what you need to do differently moving forward? Check for understanding? And if what you're getting back is different than how you think that needs to be interpreted, then you can say, I actually think around different pages now.

okay. So you want to check for understanding before you can then get to aligned and mutual alignment is in how do you move forward. And that's how I gona hold you accountable. What are we agree to, or a line on to move forward for the goal, even though he may not agree, right? What you really want is for him to understand and also be aligned.

Yeah.

does that make sense?

Yeah, i'm I agree. I'm trying to do my part and i'm trying to to do my do the maximum not just that i'm throwing issues are on the table and saying, see what you did does not my intention here. I'm i'm i'm really trying to help because again, I need my success story.

And if I came up with this discussion with a positive outputs, it's successful him that he's going to be doing great and it's successful me because I was able to help him. 嗯， that's my scope as well. That's my what's i'm looking for.

What you're dealing is you're planting all the seeds to increase the probability of that happening of IT being a success story. But obviously, there is no guarantee that I will be a success stories .

and and .

that's all you can do, that all you can do. okay. So when you think about the question that you had when you first came into the conversation and where you are now, what questions have been answered for you and what do you think you're gona do differently moving forward in dealing with these situations?

From the time that I got promoted to director, I was really trying to prove myself that I can take this position. Why, as I mention this to was chAllenging time. So I read a lot of articles and I attended many podcast.

I felt that I was in healing a lot of information, but i'm not able to ask here. I just need to I need to meditate and to just delete my breathing. So it's not just i'm going to read, I need, I need to take some outs, but I want to make sure that i'm exhaling in the right way.

So when I was coming here, I had a lot of thoughts about this situation. I was really frustrated. I'm not saying now that i'm relieved this still I am feeling uncomfortable. I still am having my duties and this kind of discussion that we are agreeing.

It's not going to be easy as we are having now, but at least i'm able to see a map and a plan that I can put the piece that i'm understanding the the frustration that might come from the other side and how I need to digested and ensure that i'm giving the support. It's not that i'm attacking or i'm just fingerpointing as I mention, this is a plan that we are we will be working on IT. That's what I need from you and let me know what you need from my site to be able to get for what we are looking for. So at the end, i'm giving the good intention is his decision at this stage either to collaborate or I wouldn't say get out of the bus, but let's yeah to sit in the inside, in the right place within the bus, a distinction.

Okay, terrific. And yes, you can excel.

No.

thank you, mom.

Thank you.

At this stage in his career, moo has realized one of the hardest st parts about managing, driving accountability on your team and making sure everyone on the team is performing at the level expected, motivating employees to stay engaged, having the tough conversations and making the difficult decisions, when most instinct to think about what he could do differently to manage the staff issues he's facing as a good one. And a key takeaway here that every leader needs to pick up is knowing the difference between when an issue on your team calls for coaching versus when IT calls for a performance management approach. Unless you know that you have different options at your disposal to manage your team delivers, you'll continue to feel stuck rather than move forward with a plan as moo is now able to do.

Bets IT for the episode of coaching real leaders next time. I guess I feel quite certain in my mind that it's time to make a change. And I think where I stand out a bit is for so long, i've kind of got to the right school and on the right up and then taking their next role in the next role.

The next role and most of my career has was positioned me for what I guess is, objectively speaking, kind of a traditionally big job because sea level executive at a public company that role. And now that I find myself kind of at the precipice of that next ological step, I feel pretty uncertain. I have a really important ask of you if you love the coaching conversations on coaching real leaders.

IT would mean the world to me if you can head over to apple, spotify or wherever ever you listen to your favorite podcast and subscribe to the show. And while you're there, leave a five star review. And of course, if you think others would learn from these episodes, please share IT with them.

If you want more of coaching real leaders, join me on coaching real leaders. Community that come where I host exclusive wife discussions to unpack every episode and answer your questions. You can also find me on lincoln at merial walkings and on instagram at coach morial walkings.

If you are dealing with the leadership chAllenge, i'd love to hear from you and possibly have you on the show apply at coaching real leaders dot com. Thanks to my producer mary do, sound editor nick rinka, music composer brian cambell, my assistant Emily sofa in the entire team. A, H.

B. R. Much gratitude to the leaders who join me in these coaching conversations into you are listeners who share in their journeys from the H.

B. R. Podcast network. I mural walkings until next time be well.