There are three Petri dishes in our life where “It’s not fair” resides, breeds and wreaks havoc: “Work,” “Home” and “The Past.” Over the next three posts I’m going to offer up a quiz for each and then a nice clean prescription to cure what ails you.

Work Is Not Fair QUIZ

Read each statement and give yourself a point for each statement you say “yes” to. At the end, tally up your points and see how you did.

1. I expect my boss to be responsible for my career path
2. I expect my boss to be promoting me in meetings when I’m not around
3. I expect my work product to be enough for me to get recognized at work
4. I resent that bosses throughout my career have generally treated me unfairly
5. I resent that some of my colleagues get better treatment than I do
6. I resent how I’m treated by coworkers at work
7. I resent the demands my boss places on me
8. I resent how my career has played out
9. I deserve more opportunities
10. I deserve more pay
11. I deserve a promotion

Key:

0-3 “Yes” answers = Normal gripes, complaints and misconceptions common at any workplace. You’re likely in the clear.

4-7 “Yes” answers = You are on the edge of slipping into that deep dark place we call “a lack of personal responsibility.” It will ultimately mean that all of your worse fears of unfairness will likely come true.

8-11 “Yes” answers = You’re there. I would describe your life as a series of daily disappointments, a cesspool of unmet expectations and resentment. A complete attitude overhaul is in order.

Your Prescription

Note the sentence stems in the quiz above. Phrases like “I resent” and “I deserve” are great indicators that one is sitting back waiting and evaluating what life is dishing out. Such phrases are commonly used by editors not authors. Your workplace prescription is simple: author your career and life, don’t just edit what you are given.

Author your long-term career plan – the days are long, long gone (like 1950’s movies gone) when managers took a young promising professional and groomed him or her into a leader, rewarding and promoting them along the way. It is your job to identify what you want and where you want to go in your career. No one elses.

State what you need – if you want a raise, ask for it. If you want a promotion, ask for it. Only by asking can you determine if the organization will give you what you need or if you need to find another home.

Put blinders on – “What?” you say. “Brandon, are you crazy?” Here’s what I mean. If you are clear on what you want, what you need and where you are going, then it doesn’t really matter if your colleague gets picked over you for the promotion to Wichita – particularly if you have no interest in moving there (no offense to our Wichita friends). Focus on you and don’t worry about everyone else. This isn’t middle school… at least it’s not supposed to be.

Keep moving forward – always keep looking for other opportunities inside your organization AND outside your organization that will keep you moving down your career path. When we stop moving and creating, we begin editing and complaining. Keep moving.

There you have it. Your prescription for staving off the dysfunction of “it’s not fair.” As long as you keep moving forward and continue to author the story of your career and life, you will be a happy, empowered and dare I say “healthy” adult.

Or, then again, you can just choose to blame others. If you haven’t seen the Disney movie, “Meet the Robinsons,” you’re missing out. I think this clip sums up the choice in front of each of us quite well.

It’s Not Fair

Hearing “it’s not fair,” is unfortunately a normal occurrence when you are surrounded by human beings under the age of 18. While I wish I could say that the only time I ever hear “it’s not fair” is at home with my kids, I cannot. We can all attest to hearing grown adults utter those painful words. From complaining about not getting a promotion at work to lamenting about how life has turned out, “It’s not fair” is a debilitating disease that if allowed to creep into one’s mind, it weakens resolve, sours the spirit and poisons one’s attitude.

This month, we are going to take on this self-limiting dysfunction. Taking an “it’s not fair” attitude holds us back from the life we could have. Whether it’s you that needs to change or it’s someone else, getting past “it’s not fair” unlocks two treasures everyone wants in life: opportunity and empowerment. It allows one to write his or her own personal scorecard for what’s important versus complaining about the one he or she is dealt. Before we go too far down this path, it’s only fair (no pun intended… o.k. maybe a small one) that I share my own personal philosophy on this particular dysfunction:

• Life is NOT fair – I’m sorry you aren’t Donald Trump, Beyonce, or a member of the Royal Couple (if you are, welcome to my blog! Send me a note. We’ll do lunch.). Get real.
• “It’s not fair” is about complaining and critiquing what life has sent you from the kitchen. Life rewards authors, not editors. Get cooking and creating, not complaining and editing.
• “It’s not fair” is about waiting, sitting and receiving. It’s not about moving, exploring and doing. Get moving.
• “It’s not fair” assumes someone else has all of the cards and I must sit and accept what I am dealt. Get empowered.
• Life can be wonderful. Regardless of the circumstances someone faces in life, with a healthy daily dose of personal responsibility, empowerment and appreciation, life can be a daily gift. Get appreciating.

So you have a job you don’t like? Leave it. You are unhappy with the path you chose? Change it. I have a mantra in my house that my kids know all too well. “Decision-makers pay.” If one of them begins to complain about dinner, I announce to the table that that particular offspring of mine has decided to pay for dinner. It is a not-so-subtle reminder to them that complaining cannot be served up without a side of action and ownership. They have to choose: stop complaining or change the meal any way they like by forking over the cash.

The choice for us this month is simple:

Accept and appreciate what we have or take action to change it. Either path is healthy and empowering. Complaining about life’s unfairness is not an option.

Trust me, there is plenty of ice cream for everyone.

Trust is a powerful word.

How does trust fit in with our theme this month? Simple. Trust is somewhere on a beach right now sipping a pina colada enjoying the smooth silky rays of the Caribbean sun. Where trust isn’t is at work. Most senior leadership today is having a very difficult time trusting others and that’s causing a unique set of problems and dysfunctions.

Ways Senior Management Doesn’t Trust Today

MICROMANAGING – Need I say more? I was talking with a SVP at a global technology company about her job and here’s what she told me, “I used to love my job. I’ve been doing this kinda work all of my career. But recently, it hasn’t been near as much fun or as fulfilling. The problem is the CEO. About twice a month I meet with him to go over my reports, analysis and recommendations on what we need to be doing. Instead of trusting me to do my job and using that time to really dig into options, scenarios and strategies, he literally pulls out his calculator and goes over all of my calculations. Talk about unmotivating.” Did I mention she was a SVP at the top of her field? Ridiculous…

WHO’S GOT THE “D” – A peculiar flavor of this “no trust” dysfunction has emerged over the last few years. I recently saw this with a room full of mid-level leaders at a large financial services organization. Here’s how it works. Senior management decides they want their team (VP’s, SVP’s, etc…) to operate with more ownership and initiative. After all, they are tired of feeling like everyone is looking to them for answers. Sounds good, right? The problem comes in when the question is posed back to senior leadership by their direct reports, “so, does that mean we also are empowered to make decisions? And what decisions can we make anyway?” Senior management often responds by saying they still want to make all of the decisions, they just want others to take more ownership and accountability. Frustrating to say the least.

Why Senior Management Doesn’t Trust

There are a couple of reasons why senior management doesn’t show much trust today. They’ll come as no surprise.

Reason #1 – They are afraid to take their hands off the steering wheel. They’ve been gripping the controls of the organization tightly to keep it from hurtling over the cliff. Now the time has come to loosen the group and get others involved. But they just can’t seem to do it.

Reason #2 – Trust = Vulnerability.  Vulnerability = Weakness and Risk. Vulnerability is hard without a doubt, but you can’t have trust without it. While I hate the idea of doing trust falls and other “ropes course-like” silliness, the concept is right on. Trust is about relying on someone else to catch you, support you and deliver on the results that you are held accountable for.

So, take a moment to imagine that you are the CEO and you don’t trust anyone around you. A moment of silence and sympathy for those leaders who are suffering from a reluctance to trust others. Why be sympathetic, you ask? Because those leaders have to be tired. The sheer volume of work they must be doing (everyone’s job after all) and the loneliness they must feel is not enviable. A lack of trust is exhausting and isolating.

Your Prescription

This particular dysfunction can be cured but it takes some intentionality and self-management.

If you are a direct report, consider the following:

• Clarify what it would take for your boss to trust you. Ask him or her what trust “looks like” and how you could get there.
• Share what it is costing you and them to operate without it. Let them know how frustrating it feels and unmotivating it is to know that you are not fully trusted.

If you are the senior leader, consider the following:

• Think of one small decision that you can and should delegate to one of your directs. Start small. The key here is when you delegate it, really delegate it. Empower them to do it their way and make any necessary decisions. Hold them accountable for the results but leave the rest up to them.
• Understand the difference between “quality checking” and “auditing.” Quality checking is the head chef that occasionally tastes the food to make sure it is up to standard. Perfectly fine for any leader. The auditor makes it his/her job to double check everything. Leaders can not afford to be auditors.
• Avoid the “How” as much as you can and focus on the “what, when and why.” This is the perfect preventative measure to counter micromanagement.
• Tell one person this week that you trust him or her. Simple in concept but I can’t tell you how many senior leaders I know that struggle with saying it. However, there are very few things that are music to one’s soul than to hear someone they respect say, “I trust you.”

One of the wonderful leaders I’ve gotten to work with over this past year is an absolute master of this. Whenever one of his direct reports comes to him with a problem, he quickly responds, “what do you think we should do?” After they give an answer, he says to them, “you are a seasoned and competent professional. You wouldn’t be here if you weren’t. I trust you to do the right thing and get it done.” And off they go with his blessing. The performance of his team, their loyalty and overall results of their organization in their market are off the chart.

Put in place these simple prescriptions and I promise you a turnaround of wonderful proportions.

Trust me.

Senior management breaking promises is nasty any time it happens. However, this particular dysfunction has risen up the charts over the past four or five years. I hear it from every walk of life from the fresh recruit to the long-time manager in the firm. And I hear it in any and every industry you could imagine ranging from non-profitst to banking. Senior leaders make lofty promises to keep star players and when the time comes to make due on their promises, they run the other way. No one in this economy seems immune.

Ways Senior Management Breaks Promises Today

THE LOST PROMOTION – Like the hunt for lost treasure, you’re given a map (typically at the conclusion of your annual performance review) with an X that marks the promotion spot. You work diligently throughout the year charting your course.  When you finally arrive at the X after a year of hard work, you see someone else standing on what should be your spot. The promise of a promotion if you hold out for one more year is tantalizing to resist and frequently broken. Note: the more severe case of this particular dysfunction in the U.S. rests with our friends who are looking for green card sponsorship from the organization on their path to citizenship. They are often dragged for years with the promise that it will be “next year.” Cruel and unacceptable treatment to say the least.

THE DISAPPEARING RAISE – This one is particularly troublesome. An employee is promised a raise if they take on (or continue to take on) an excessive workload complete with challenging workplace fires. After one year, the firefighting employee comes out on the other side successful (although slightly singed) and senior management suddenly forgets their promise of more benjamins. As the discussion heats up, senior management commonly defaults to any of several arguments:

• “I don’t know what you are talking about. We would never have promised something like that.”
• “If we do that for you, we’ll have to do it for everyone.”
• “If we did that, you would be making too much money (and/or more money than your boss, etc…).”
• “Things have changed. We can no longer afford to do that.”

Why Senior Management Breaks Promises

“But Brandon, why is this happening?  Didn’t senior management get the ‘ethics memo’ that the last economic cycle taught us?”  I couldn’t agree more, but unfortunately the answer is to the question is quite simple. Senior management breaks promises more today than I have ever seen in my career simply because they can. What do I mean by that? Consider the following reasons:

Reason #1: Talent isn’t going anywhere – Senior management knows that there is no real competition for talent today. Sure, some jobs and some players are hot commodities, but broadly speaking, most of us can’t quit a job today and land a similar or better one tomorrow without some real work. It is a buyer’s market and we are all sellers. Senior management knows this and so their choice is to either take advantage of their people or do the right thing.

Reason #2: Do more with less – Senior management is operating under the mantra of “do more with less.” Whether it’s their personal leadership mantra or they have a Board dictating “leanness” and “efficiency,” they want to squeeze every last drop out of every last employee for as little as possible. That means no raises, promotions or hiring if they can avoid it.

Reason #3: Fear of adding headcount – Let me be clear. Cash is not the problem with the majority of for-profit organizations today. The issue is that most senior managers fear adding additional people and overall headcount. To them, more people equates to more on-going expenses and headaches related to selection, on-boarding, managing and ultimately downsizing if necessary. And don’t forget the messiness and confusion surrounding benefits packages today (insurance, pensions, etc…). As a result, new roles are not getting created easily so there is nowhere to move existing players regardless of their performance.

Your Prescription

This particular dysfunction grows in dark, damp places. Your best strategy is to shine a bright light everywhere you can to keep it from rooting.

If you are an employee, consider the following:

If you are agreeing to any promotion or salary increases, PUT IT IN WRITING. Get the promise down on paper so it looks and feels like a contract.  Assume that if you don’t spell it out what everyone is agreeing to, the other party will take advantage of the fuzziness and of you. Have your manager sign it and consider “cc’ing” HR and/or have them present to sign it as well. If it is spelled out clearly and signed by multiple players, you are preventing senior management amnesia.

If it’s too late and you have already had promises broken, your best strategy is to form a coalition of others who have suffered a similar fate and bring your collective complaints to the attention of senior management and HR. To pull this off, you will need to be prepared to quit if the commitments made to you and your colleagues are not fulfilled. Why do this as a group? One vocal voice is almost always written off as a troublemaker, but a group is usually taken seriously. Not to mention, a mass resignation is a fire that senior management does not want to have to address.

If you are a senior leader, consider the following:

As a leader, you are as good as your word. If you make a promise, you should do everything in your power to keep it. And if for some reason you cannot (there may be legitimate reasons), have the managerial courage to address the broken promise prior to the time of the agreed upon time of ”payment.” Your integrity, honesty and concern for the people working for you will serve you well today and tomorrow. 

The time of reckoning is coming. I can see the clouds on the horizon and I can smell the change in the air like the smell of an approaching thunderstorm. Companies will soon begin to open up the hiring floodgates as they have no other choice in order to achieve their grand plans. Couple that with Boomers beginning the transition into retirement and you’ve got a storm of sorts. Real leaders will be revealed over night as employees have the choice to stay or to go. Real leaders will lose no one.  And with a stable of committed employees aboard, organizations led by true leaders will rise to the top quickly as their competition loses employees at a record pace.  Crewless, ships with dysfunctional captains will crash into the rocks amidst the crashing waves of a new economy.

Which will you be? The choice is yours and starts with the simple promises you make today.

Is senior management at your organization guilty of not listening?

Ways Senior Management Doesn’t Listen Today

What are the unique versions of this nasty dysfunction today? Consider the following:

• “My ideas have ALWAYS worked before” – Why should I listen to anyone else? My ideas have always worked before. This is a dangerous trap that many senior leaders fall into. They assume (incorrectly) that because they’ve been successful in the past, they will be equally successful in the future simply by making similar (if not the exact same) decisions. They fail to consider that the context has likely changed (Ex: the state of the economy, changes in customer behaviors, technology, destabilization of their industry, etc…). Take the story of Bob Nardelli at The Home Depot as a perfect example. Bob came from GE as a heralded leader to take over the helm from founders Bernie Marcus and Arthur Blank. Bob insisted on doing things the “GE way” nearly his entire tenure at Home Depot. He banked that efficiency and low price were what customers really wanted. The problem? At GE, the businesses he ran all were successful with that formula. But in the world of home improvement retail, service and convenience trump low cost in nearly every case. After several painful years, Bob was shown the door leaving a culture catastrophe in his wake.
• “I know what customers REALLY want” – A seductive trap that is all too common. When management begins to assume that he or she is actually the customer, bad things begin to happen. They assume that their needs and wants are in fact what the real customers actually desire.  As a result, the entire marketing function and, frankly the customers themselves, become irrelevant. We look at the recent story of J. C. Penney for a perfect example. Ronald B. Johnson’s stint as the CEO of J. C. Penney was a brief 17 months. In that time, he rolled out change after change based on what he wanted refusing to listen to marketing or do any customer research. The result? Customers left and soon followed Ron (for the full article, go here).
•  “I want uniformity, simplicity and standardization” – What senior management team hasn’t been preaching this over the last 4-5 years? The challenge with this mantra is that there are always necessary exceptions to grand plans of simplicity and standardization. The trap comes in refusing to listen to those necessary exceptions. If the leadership team labels those exceptions as “resistance to change” and “excuse-making” rather than listening for real risks and concerns, the team runs the risk of shooting the entire organization in the foot. Consider the story of a large global financial services corporation. Several years ago, the CEO announced that all divisions, without exception, were to implement a 10% headcount reduction. The problem? The mature divisions could pull off the headcount reduction without missing a beat. After all, their business was mature and wasn’t growing any time soon. But there was one division in the company that was an exception. This particular division was only a few years old and was on the cutting edge of the industry. It was riding the emerging wave of technology and as a result was doubling every year – in both revenues and people. A 10% reduction would kill its progress and allow competitors to catch up. The CEO refused to hear the argument. The rising rock star division had to make its cuts. As a result, it went from first in the industry to middle-of-the-pack overnight.

Why Don’t They Listen?

“But Brandon,” you say, “this has got to be rare. After all, what kind of person does this and still becomes successful enough to be part of a senior management team?” I hear ya.  There are several reasons why senior leaders don’t listen. Some are well-intentioned, some are a result of how they were trained and some are simply the result of “bad eggs” in senior roles.

Reason #1: Attempting to simplify an ever-increasingly complex world – Sometimes leaders don’t listen because they are trying to make the current situation less complex. They see confusion and turmoil swirling around the organization. From emerging disruptive technologies, to smaller margins and pickier consumers, for most organizations the world is uncertain to say the least. As a result, senior management picks a path, covers their eyes and ears and starts moving.

Reason #2: The wrong training – Many leaders rise up through the ranks because of their ability to make quick decisions with limited data. Analytical skills that are highly coveted and rewarded in fields such as finance, engineering, accounting, law and medicine train leaders to make snap decisions and trust their judgment above all else. Thus, in times of stress they rely on only one person – the one in the mirror.

Reason #3: Fear – Sometimes a lack of listening is the result of fear. Fear that they’ll hear bad news. Fear that they’ll hear reasons why their strategies won’t work. Fear that paralysis will set in. Fear that the organization will fold under their watch. As a result, they close the door, turn off their phones and wax nostalgic about times when life was good and every decision they made was right.

Reason #4: Hubris – Sometimes leaders don’t listen because they have had an unfortunately lengthy track record of their decisions being the right ones. They begin believing that they have a golden touch and can do no wrong regardless of the situation or problem. Couple that with direct reports that tell him or her how amazing they are and you end up with a narcissistic deity complex – nasty to treat and even nastier to follow if you are one of their employees.

Your Prescription

Overcoming senior management that is reluctant to listen is critical to everyone’s health, including that of the organization. If you are trying to get senior management to listen, remember one of the most fundamental principles of influencing: others are open to being influenced (in other words, willing to listen to you) when they feel heard first. Listen to what senior management talks about and cares about. Hook your conversations to those hot topics and you’ll find them suddenly receptive to what you have to say. In these situations, packaging is everything.

If you are a senior leader and you want to avoid the traps above, here’s your prescription. Take daily.

Test all of your ideas and / or possible decisions by ask the following questions and truly listening for answers:

• What assumptions am I basing my strategies on? Does the current situation support those assumptions or refute them? What evidence do I have?
• What do customers say? Would my most valuable customers support this decision and / or the direction I want to take? What evidence do I have?
• What risks / exceptions do I need to consider? Have I asked others what I should be considering?
• What other stakeholder groups might be impacted and how can I get their honest input?

The above questions are hard. They require careful thought, data collection, analysis and synthesis – something that any senior leader worth his or her salt should be capable of executing. However, If you can’t or simply won’t ask the preceding questions, not only are you a poor listener, but you should never be in senior management. You are a senior “gambler.” You are a risk to the organization and I would recommend your immediate termination.

Then again, if you are reading this today, I’ve got a good feeling about you…