Whose problem is it?

by Chuck ViolandAs leaders or managers in our organizations, it’s easy to fall into the trap of being the chief problem solver.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Being able to solve problems is a critical part of being an effective leader.

Making the big decisions is our job. But, being the chief problem solver means that we not only solve our own problems, but we also take on the problems of the people in our organizations, and essentially make their decisions for them — decisions they should be making for themselves.

I need control!

The seductiveness of being the chief problem solver is extremely difficult for most entrepreneurs and managers to resist.

For many people the need to feel in control is almost tangible. We can just about feel its warmth as we wrap ourselves in the security of being the chief problem solver.

We feel needed when our people come to us to figure things out. Having people bring their problems to us feeds right into our basic need to feel needed and important.

Let’s face it, the more often people bring their problems to us to solve, the more irreplaceable we feel.

And the greater the number of times we’re interrupted by calls on our cell phones, the more important we must be.Don’t feed the endless cycle

Unfortunately these activities do nothing to break the cycle that shackles us to our businesses.

All they do is continue to feed the cycle that makes us the chief problem solver. And the amazing part is we’re the ones who created these environments within our organizations.

Sometimes this happens without our even realizing it. But, whether we create them intentionally or not, the results are the same.

When we continue to foster an environment where we’re the chief problem solver in our organizations, we become the bottleneck through which all the decisions in our organizations must pass.

Our people don’t develop the skills necessary to handle decisions on their own.

Creating unpleasantness

This condition creates many unpleasant by-products, but perhaps the most troubling is that our most talented people don’t stick around.

One of the reasons they don’t stick around is that they don’t feel challenged or allowed to grow by making decisions that affect their work.

So we’re left with the employees who either can’t make informed decisions on their own because they were never shown how, or don’t want to make decisions because when they do they get yelled at by the boss.

Then the cycle repeats itself. And it continues to repeat itself until we become so frustrated that we find ourselves railing in self-righteous indignation: "Can’t anybody around here make decisions for themselves?! Do I have to do all the thinking?"

Well, actually, yes; we do have to do all the thinking… until we decide to break the cycle.

It’s all your fault

In their book Flight of the Buffalo, authors James Belasco and Ralph Stayer write, "As the leader of my organization I am responsible for creating the environment that enables each person to assume responsibility for his or her own performance. The people own the responsibility for delivering great performance. I am responsible for creating the environment where this ownership takes place."

This is a profound statement about leading an organization in today’s world.

It doesn’t really matter what business we’re in or what organization we manage. At the end of the day, we’re in the people business. We might manage a custodial staff at a university, run a contract cleaning company, clean carpet, dry structures, sell or distribute chemicals, sell or design software or paint bridges.

But these are just the products and services we sell or manage. Our primary business is still people.When you stop to think about it, we don’t really sell or provide our services to companies or facilities. We sell or provide them to people.

We don’t have employees who work for us. We have people who work with us, and families who depend on us.

Once we understand that we are really in the people business, then we can get to work creating an environment in our companies that "enables each person to assume responsibility for his or her own performance," like James Belasco and Ralph Stayer wrote about in their book.

Creating this environment starts with removing ourselves from the role of chief problem solver in our companies.

Here are some suggestions to help determine whether we’re acting as the chief problem solver in our organizations and, if so, how to change it.

1. Ask yourself how often you find yourself solving a problem or making a decision for someone else in your organization. Look for telltale signs. How often are you interrupted, either in your office or on your mobile phone, by people needing questions answered or decisions made? I wonder how often Jack Welsh got interrupted to help decide on the shape and size of GE light bulbs? I wonder how successful GE would have been if he had?2. Ask yourself why you’re the one dealing with this problem or decision. Does this decision really require an executive to make it?3. Delegate the decisions that have to be made to the people who have a stake in their outcome. If you’ve done your executive-level job of hiring the right people to start with, and then developed them to their full potential, then have confidence that they’ll make good decisions. 

4. Follow up. Notice that in point #3 it says delegate the decisions, not abdicate the decisions. Sometimes you’ll still need to follow up to make sure the decisions were made, or the problems were solved. Then be sure to congratulate your people on their good work.Learn from experience

A short while ago I was talking with a friend who had just returned from a two-week visit to Russia. He was expressing mixed emotions about the situation he found in his business when he returned.

He commented: "There were no big issues that I had to address. No long list of problems to solve. In fact, I felt a little uneasy because things had gone so well while I was away."

He went on to say that, on one hand, he felt that his people no longer needed him. At the same time he felt the satisfaction that he had done his job of developing the leadership talents in his people to the point where they could handle things on their own.

http://www.advantagecleaningteam.com/ or http://www.janiservu.com/