Training Badge
Submitted by JohnGMacAskill on
in

Forums

In a team meeting this morning I took the team in general to task for not completing a minor, but agreed, task for todays team meeting. I got serious 'push back' from the senior, most experienced member of my team regarding the minor nature of the task and that he/we are busy and 'we' must prioritise better, etc, on the 'bigger' issues we have. This surprised me, and I took it as a direct challenge and pushed back. I don't think I a) handled it as well as I could have done or b) got my message across that, it may be minor, and that could be debated, but if we agree on an action and a result I expect it to happen. I am very interested in any suggestions about addressing this with my team and the individual.

Some background: I am a director and have a small direct reporting sales team of 3. All varying levels of experience. I have a particular issue with the management culture in the rest of the business. Too many people leave meetings without proper agreed actions and the next meeting tends to just start where the last discussions left off!

I am trying to manage this team in a different way; regular O3's, weekly team meetings and a monthly sales meeting. I am also trying to address policy and process discipline issues, etc.

Cheers.

Mark's picture
Admin Role Badge

First, it's terribly ineffective to take the team to task. Everyone will privately see the shotgun blast as aimed at everyone else, and disassociate themselves from it.

When you get push back from someone in a group after a shotgun negative, it's a reminder to just say, "you know what, you're right to step up. I regret just blasting you guys. I need to get my thoughts together, and talk with each of you individually about your role - or lack thereof - and we can work this out.

I don't exactly get what the topic was, and no need. The opportunity here is in process.

Mark

sholden's picture
Licensee BadgeTraining Badge

Mark,

Thanks for the shotgun analogy ... it makes sense to something that I experienced a while back but couldn't put into good context.

I did something similar about 5 months ago and it went over very badly and I wasn't so sure why, but now I can see how this would break down the feedback model effectiveness.

Good lesson learned.

Steve

JohnGMacAskill's picture
Training Badge

Mark,

Thanks for the comment. This was a well learnt lesson, I want make sure I take everything from it I can. I will be thinking hard over the weekend on how I can address this right in the O3's next week.

Great podcasts and this is my first 'help' posting in the forum...so thanks and keep it up guys.

John