Silence looks peaceful until your best people leave.
EXPERT OPINION BY ENTREPRENEURS’ ORGANIZATION @ENTREPRENEURORG
This article was written byAnna Lecat, anEntrepreneurs’ Organizationmember in Paris. She is a three-time global CEO, the best-selling author ofLoving Conflict, and a conflict and communications expert who works with boards and executive teams across three continents.Lecat shares why it’s in your best interest to surface lingering problems before they fester.
When I work with a company’s executive team or board, it is usually for a keynote or a workshop, not to fix a specific team. And still, before long, the conversation nobody wants to start reveals itself.
It shows up in small ways — two people who stop looking at each other, a decision that keeps coming up and going nowhere. Your team has been avoiding it for months, sometimes years, and everyone in the room knows exactly which one.
Most founders brace for the argument, for someone
Most founders brace for the argument, for someone storming out or going cold. So you work hard to keep the room calm. Yet the argument is rarely the part that costs you.
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What costs you is the decision that never gets made because the two people who need to disagree keep choosing not to, whether it’s about the pricing no one will question or the hire who clearly is not working yet whose name somehow never reaches the agenda.
What lurks beneath calm waters
The calm can fool you. I have walked into companies where everyone is warm and agreeable. The meeting starts on time. Nobody pushes on anything, and something in me tenses.
It is all so smooth. The word that comes up for me is bankrupt. Often, the real meeting happens afterward, in the hallway or parking lot, where people finally say what they think, and no one writes it down.
Source: www.inc.com
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