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Shortcuts are not always the quickest road to success
Martijn is the manager of a support service at a university. The service needs organisational changes but for some reason or another he has not been able to achieve them. Martijn has been trying to implement a more uniform way of working so different teams can support each other in case of lack of staff but the more he insists the more they resist. Martijn is visibly agitated. His finger-tapping on the table tells me he is impatient to get things done.
This is not the first time I am meeting a manager in a hurry. It makes sense, up to a point. After all, it is not that difficult to come up with a new strategy. But why is it so complicated to convince people to adopt it? There are all sorts of reasons. People like their tried and tested routines, which they can fall back on as if slipping into a comfy pair of slippers. But if you are being told that things must change it feels as if you must exchange your slippers for a pair of new shoes which will probably give you blisters.
Martijn has not gauged the resistance in the teams, he simply doesn’t have the time for endless discussions in distant locations. He is a man on a mission!
Instead of saying that this would be a good way forward, I tell Martijn a story about a farmer and his sheep.
One day the sheep have eaten most of the grass in the field and the farmer decides it’s time to move them to another field. He starts steering his sheep in the right direction, but the sheep don’t understand what all the fuss is about. The farmer’s commands fail to make an impression on the sheep which start to run like wild.
After an afternoon of chasing sheep, the exhausted farmer sits down on a bench while the sheep regroup. The farmer decides to change his approach. ‘Dear sheep, please tell me why you don’t want to go into the other field?’, he asks. The sheep prick up their ears, surprised at being asked. ‘Well,’ one sheep says, ‘we have a really good fence here and it’s doing a good job at protecting us from wolves.’ Then another sheep adds: ‘and there is a very nice tree here to give us shade in summer and shelter from the rain’. It is slowly beginning to dawn on the farmer that the sheep may have a point. ‘So, if I get you a fence and a place to shelter you might be prepared to move?’, he says. Then one adventurous sheep says: ‘Yes, I would be in the game.’ And of course, once one sheep crosses the dam, the others are bound to follow, as an old Dutch proverb has it.
‘Hmm,’ Martijn says. ‘Do you mean to say I should take more time to ask the teams why they oppose the changes?’ I raise, that this would be a good start, since other efforts have not worked so far.
Leadership is not just about getting results. Leaders spend a large proportion of their time influencing processes, dealing with opposition, and navigating office politics. We talk about these aspects of leadership for a while as Martijn realises something: shortcuts are not always the quickest road to success.
Aletta Wubben
Coach
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