Two Way

People underperform. People mess up. People need confrontation and they need help.

Help is pretty easy to give.

For many of us, regardless of how many years we’ve been in leadership, confrontation is the hard part.

No normal person likes confrontation.

It’s fundamentally unpleasant to have to sit with someone and say, “you are doing a bad job and it is not acceptable.”

Most people have had someone in leadership have that conversation with them at some point in their lives. Even if it wasn’t that severe, corrective conversations are not fun.

No one enjoys having their flaws pointed out.

It’s kind of wild — you think, when you’re an employee or a team member or even a manager, that the worst thing in the world is to be on the receiving end of a conversation like this.

I can say with confidence — being on the delivery end is worse.

WORSE.

The worst.

But, if you want to be a good leader, these are cauterizing conversations. They staunch the flow of something that will eventually be a bleed out: irreversible. Deadly.

You must pay close enough attention and be brave enough to have these conversations swiftly, at the first sign of a problem. You must also control your emotions, not spinning out, “they owe me! I’ve done so much for them! Who else would’ve hired them with no experience? They have no idea how good they have it! How dare they ghost/phone it in/quiet quit!?”

Spoiler alert: they don’t care.

You have to care because you have the responsibility. You may need the pity party (fine, do it, get over it).

But then you need to have the conversation.

And I have a very specific narrative that helps me have more pragmatic and productive corrective conversations. Honestly, it especially works with Gen-Zers.

And, not to betray my age right after referencing that, but it’s essentially to treat them like I treat my kids.

I deal with underperformance, lack of communication, or low quality/delivery by setting the terms of reciprocity, reiterating that this is a two way street.

The street is much wider on my side (and that’s okay), but we do owe each other a measured portion of something.

With your kids, you instinctively set the terms for measured reciprocity:

I will care for you, love you, feed you, nurture you…

…and you will obey rules set to support your safety and growth.

That’s a fair exchange.

It is not fair to say to your kids, “you must complete me,” or, “you must not embarrass me,” or “you must take care of me,” or “you must represent me in the world and achieve things so I can live vicariously through you.”

That’s unfair, because they’re the children and you’re the parent.

This carries over into leadership:

I will care for you, communicate with you, pay you, be here for you…

…and you will follow the guidelines of our business for the good of the team and company as a whole.

That’s a fair exchange.

It’s not fair to say to your employees, “you must like and approve of everything I do,” or “you must be there for me emotionally,” or, “you must achieve great things that I can take credit for and stay small so I can grow large.”

So, tease out what’s fair.

Then, define the two way street and position challenging conversations accordingly.

Say, pragmatically and out loud:

This is a reciprocal relationship. As you know, you must follow the guidelines of this business for the good of the team and the company. Here are my expectations and your responsibilities on this two way street. Here are the ways you are not meeting those. Is there any way in which you don’t have what you need to hold up your side? Is there anything I don’t know?

Sometimes there will be things you didn’t know.

Because at the end of the day, people are way more than the work they do.

But what this does is creates the objective measure and reminds them that their side of the effort is not negotiable.

If you do not do what you have promised to do, it hurts me and it hurts everyone else on your team.

This is a two way street.

Do you want to continue on it?

One of many ways to tackle hard conversations. But I’ve had some success with it.

Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com.