you had a tough-stuff conversation where you have sat back and thought to yourself, ‘I could have done that differently', and it weighed heavily on you for a while? A feeling of, ‘If I could have changed this then the outcome would have been different'? Imagine if there were something in this book that allowed you to be able to influence a situation so that it did not escalate. Wouldn't that be a life changer?
Let's raise the bar on what these strategies could mean for you, because you have nothing to lose anyway. To quote from Michelangelo: ‘The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it'.
We are practical and pragmatic people, and that's how we want you to view and use this book. We have designed the book to provide you with a wealth of resources, information and portals to access ongoing learning.
The key to implementing changes is to start putting into place the strategies outlined in this book throughout your day-to-day activities. The strategies are purposefully practical and relevant for the workplace.
Here's another suggestion to assist you in maximising your learning throughout the book: whenever you come across a key point, practical strategy or new idea you want to use, note it down. Whether you use an electronic diary or a paper diary, take the time to add one note into your calendar every Monday morning for the next however-many weeks. If you make 25 notes while reading the book, you have just created six months' worth of Monday-morning reminders to help adjust and shape your behaviour.
With a deep expertise in human behaviour (two psychologists, a behavioural scientist and all of us parents of very young children), we possess a wealth of understanding, experience and research in dealing with the tough stuff in our working careers. As well as providing you with key research, case studies and information, we have also provided you with our own insights from different points of view. At the end of each chapter you'll find insights from Darren, Alison and Sean, each from a slightly different perspective.
Darren's insights come from a behavioural economics perspective and relate the information in that chapter to the business environment. Darren loves the game of business.
Alison's insights consider the things that may get in the way of making changes and she suggests strategies for addressing these barriers by tapping into values, drivers and motivations.
As a former elite athlete, and now a consulting psychologist to some of North America's and Australia's highest profile sports and corporate organisations, Sean's insights will show you how you can relate key information to achieving success through high performance.
By bringing you our individual insights we aim to showcase other facets of human behaviour and interactions. Through our insights, we trust you will have your own insights along the way.
Tackling the tough stuff in your workplace takes courage. It may not be the sort of courage that comes to mind when you think of someone skydiving or someone who runs through a burning house to save a small child. But it takes the everyday, ordinary courage of deliberate action. It takes the courage to stop avoiding situations: to say ‘enough is enough', and to step up and be accountable.
By picking up this book, by choosing to make differences in how you deal with tough situations, by tapping back into your belief that all people are good, you are taking the courageous first step on a journey worth travelling.
1
What's your tough stuff?
Getting clear on what's tough for you
Leadership can be a lonely place at times. Sure, there are few experiences more enjoyable than leading people towards great outcomes for both themselves and your organisation, but then there's the other side of leadership. There are the times when you won't see eye to eye with others. Conflict is inevitable. That's when the loneliness of leadership truly presents itself. It certainly is a tough gig being responsible for dealing with the tough stuff.
It's worth taking the time to be clear on what the tough stuff is for you: those key work conversations that you have to have and that you would like to be better at. What are they for you?
Each of us has a unique set of skills, abilities and experiences that we bring to any tough conversation. What's tough for one person may not be tough for another. Having the personal insight into which situations are particularly tough for you will help guide you towards making relevant changes in your behaviour. One thing is certain: we can't change what we don't acknowledge.
To be able to prioritise what requires the greatest attention for improving results in your key conversations, rate yourself on the following questions and their corresponding continuums (see figure 1.1, overleaf).
Your answers to these seven questions will give you greater clarity on which tough-stuff situations you have strengths in, and which areas may need some attention. When you identify these areas to work on, you may be tempted to turn away from them because in the past you possibly avoided these situations. We urge you not to slip into old habits but to instead take the courage to change your approach.
Figure 1.1: rate your tough stuff
As you move through the process of dealing with the tough stuff, at some point you will face a state of vulnerability. It's inevitable, and you should welcome it because it will set you on the road to success. Vulnerability is the readiness to take risks, to change behaviours and to do the ‘right' thing, even in the face of uncertainty. Vulnerability is being okay with getting it wrong and making mistakes, particularly in front of your colleagues and co-workers. It's the courage to step up and try something that you believe is the right thing for your team, organisation and customers, even when you're unsure of what the outcome may be.
In a Harvard Business Review blog, Thomas J. DeLong, Professor of Management Practices at Harvard Business School, suggested that vulnerability plays a powerful role in behavioural change, both at an individual and at an organisational level. DeLong outlined a matrix that offers four options for performance. We have adapted DeLong's matrix to suit your individual process as you move through changing your behaviour and helping other people to change theirs (see figure 1.2, overleaf).
Figure 1.2: the vulnerability matrix
The vulnerability matrix is a simple quadrant model that provides four options for performance. In the column on the left, you have the opportunity to do the wrong thing well or the wrong thing poorly. And in the right-hand column, you have the choice to do the right thing well or poorly.
You will also notice that the bottom left quadrant is labelled ‘Obvious'. Generally speaking, when we do something poorly and it isn't right for us it presents itself quite clearly as something that obviously needs to change.
The top left quadrant (doing something well that's not right for us) represents something that human beings can put up with for a very, very long time. Contrary to Sigmund Freud's main theories, people don't necessarily move away from anxiety:
