Option Solving Blog

Time and again we note team leaders of every level resorting to management/supervisory practices of sweating over errors and less than perfect output of their team members. More often than not, it’s due to their perfectionist inclinations that won them promotion in the first place. They spend undue time critiquing their team members and somewhat doing their thinking for them, instead of taking the longer term view of providing positive coaching that empowers team members and creates space for the team leader to focus on more important things – e.g. thinking about and preparing for tomorrow or the road ahead. Your author-mentor decided to prepare for coaching sessions for two aspiring team leaders currently in his “stable.”

Your author-mentor gave thought to optimal solutions for these perfectionistic team leaders by asking the following question: “What is a perfectionist manager/supervisor’s optimum option for minimizing their adverse impact on team members; considering it 1) creates unnecessary interpersonal tensions, 2) undermines team member’s self-confidence, 3) encourages dependency or annoyance, and 4) spells supervision rather than leadership?” Again, it’s appropriate to focus on just these four considerations to reduce complexity in their eventual conclusion, when that ultimate moment arrives – despite there being many other possible considerations out there.

Your author decided to create yin and yang “bookends” posed by this question, to keep his/or mentee’s mind focused. Bookends such as these are vital for preventing our fertile intuitive minds from wandering and losing concentration. We are mostly unaware of how powerfully valuable but foot-loose our intuition can be unless we can keep it properly focused on such occasions.   

These turned out to be: “Sustain perfectionist behavior” – Maintain avoidable, interpersonal team member tensions;and “Enter into serious behavior modification program” – Time and expense involved w/no guarantees. You will note the italicized detractors associated with these least likely options, which shows why they are not particularly good ideas for consideration. Even so, these bookends will now hopefully nudge your editor’s intuitive thinking into high gear to come-up with a range of realistic options – see ourLatest Worked Option Example.

He then set-out to produce at least five plus realistic options – A thru F – that would enable him or his mentee to pursue Emotional Distancing (ED). EDwould allow him or a mentee to take a couple of hours or more of quiet reflection, or even sleep on it, beforecoming to any final conclusion. You can replace these proposed five options with any new ones of your own. (Note: ‘F” was left as “other,” as an opportunity for a mentee to suggest their own idea, thereby enhancing their involvement and commitment toward the exercise.)

His final options look quite interesting and both he and his mentees would be particularly intrigued by – Option C: Praise-critique sandwich: What’s right? Deal w/errors? Note more positives? –   Move on –as a starter and closely followed by A. Your editor or mentee should stand-by any initial, intuitive decision, as it would likely only work against him (them) to second-guess himself (themselves) once that initial decision is made…no matter the challenges ahead.

If you have an example of your own, please share it with this blogger, through the COMMENTS area or contact him at peter@ileadershipsolutions.com. What is a diplomatic leader’s optimum option for challenging others without losing respect? Thanks Option Solving. (NOTE: Our next posting will be in two week’s time. Let’s have your COMMENTS or go to peter@ileadershipsolutions.com. Allow time to connect with the blogger. Also consider buying the book: “Smart Decisions: Goodbye Problems, Hello Options” through amazon.com)

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