The Person You Call Difficult Might Want the Change More Than Anyone
McKinsey's Johanne Lavoie describes a leader who labeled a colleague as resistant to change, until learning her story showed she was the team's strongest change agent.
Prompted by “Leading when change feels threatening”, McKinsey (Johanne Lavoie, Brooke Weddle and Bryan Hancock).
One more idea from the same McKinsey conversation. Johanne Lavoie describes a team leader who called a colleague too aggressive and resistant to change. Lavoie asked her a simple question: do you know her story? The leader realized she knew almost nothing beyond the basics.
The company was growing fast, and this colleague kept pushing to change its systems and processes. The leader kept explaining why things were done the old way. After the team shared stories about how each of them got here, the leader saw that the person she had been labeling had the most will and drive on the team. She could be her best change agent. Once the leader stopped treating her as the problem, the relationship shifted.
Who have you filed under “difficult”?
Most owners have someone like that: long-tenured, always pushing back, sorted into a category years ago. In small and medium-sized businesses, that label sticks, because there's no HR process or reorganization to shake it loose.
The person who pushes back hardest is often the one who cares most about how the place runs, and nobody ever asked what they'd fix.
Whether you're a CEO or an owner-operator, once you've labeled someone the difficult one, you've probably stopped asking what they'd actually change.
Test it out: name the one person on your team you'd call difficult. This week, ask them: “If it were up to you, what would you change here?” Then listen to the whole answer before you say a word about why it can't be done.
Seeing your team's strongest voices clearly is the kind of thing we work through in Team Coaching.
Looking for a place to discuss issues like this with other local business leaders? Join one of our no-cost Rochester CEO insight sessions and test your ideas with your peers.
Originally posted on LinkedIn ↗