Context before correction
Be careful not to confuse process with leadership
When someone on your team does something you’re not sure about, you have two choices.
You can lead with suspicion. Build a case. Set up a formal process. Ask dozens of pointed questions. Make the person feel like a defendant before they even know what the issue is.
Or you can lead with curiosity. Have a conversation. Ask what they’re doing and why. Listen to the answers. Then decide together if anything needs to change.
The first approach might feel thorough. It might even feel responsible. But it almost always destroys the very thing you were trying to protect: trust.
Be careful not to confuse process with leadership. Following the right steps does not always mean you handled it well. The person on the receiving end does not experience your process. They experience your tone. Your assumptions. Whether you started from respect or from suspicion.
If the person was acting in good faith all along, you have now taught them something about you. Not about the rules. About you. You have taught them that their contribution is invisible until something looks wrong.
If you want to correct behaviour, start by understanding context. A single honest conversation will accomplish more than any formal inquiry. And it won’t cost you the relationship.
Understanding this is how founders turn into leaders.
Davender’s passion is to guide innovative entrepreneurs in developing the clarity, commitment, confidence and courage to enter, engage and lead their markets in a world that refuses to hold still, by thinking strategically and acting tactically.
Find out more at https://coachdavender.substack.com/about and https://linkedin.com/in/coachdavender