Leadership excuses are killing your “Relationship Based Culture”
Should a leader be feared or loved? Are leaders made or born? Wherever you stand on these questions, none of it matters when it comes to making excuses. The leader that lives by the excuse is most often a leader in name only, meaning he was given the title, he’s holding it and now he’s just hanging on hoping he doesn’t crash. Your employees want a vision. They want accountability (at least the engaged ones do). They want to follow. Make too many excuses and you’ll soon find yourself just taking a really lonely walk with no one behind you. Here are the top five excuse we have encountered over the past 20 years.
- Any excuse given for not firing non-conforming, disengaged employees – This is the leader who doesn’t want to hold employees accountable to any standard. When excusing any of these employees, this leader has been known to say… “She’s too well known in the community”; “We’re like family”; “The customers really like him”; “There’s just not much talent to choose from in our community”. The list could go on but we all have better things to do. Most of us are smart enough to know these excuses are ridiculous at best. Leaders should certainly care about their people, but when these excuses become part of the culture, your most engaged employees see it and they will either leave or become the new non-conformist. The key issue with this excuse is the leader that is not empowering managers to create and manage their own team.
- The regulatory environment is taking too many of our resources – There’s no doubt regulation has created challenges and lots of costs. That said, since all of your competition is facing the same issues it is not a valid excuse. Focus on what is within your control and have a team in place that can focus on revenue. There are tremendous opportunities for those that want to seize them. Here’s our self-serving part of the blog… Implementing a relationship-based incentive plan that pays employees for actual cross sells and not activity can bring a 10 to 1 return on your investment. You can’t afford not to do it.
- We don’t have the latest technology – Seriously?!?! A community bank without the latest and greatest technology? As crazy as it seems, this is one of the most popular excuses we hear. You many not have the latest technology but you most definitely have the technology to compete or at least access to that technology at an affordable price. You do not need to be a pioneer in technology when leading a community bank. However, the costs are dropping and there is no reason not to keep up. As a leader, if you want the latest and greatest innovations in technology, there’s a solution. But, this is not a valid excuse.
- We don’t have time for anymore meetings – If you believe this, you don’t know how to hold a meeting. You are the problem, not the meeting. Most leaders have the unique ability to turn a 30-minute meeting into a 3-hour time drain. The main reason for the insanely long meeting is the leader that is trying to manage in the team meeting. A meeting with a team should focus on the team, not the individual. Reviewing individual production in a team meeting is a poor use of time. Reviewing individual production is a management function and should be done individually. It’s productive to recognize success but unproductive to wade through the individual details. Holding high quality, short and focused meetings is the key to effective communication.
- Implementing these changes is going to cause some concern – Many were concerned about an engine on wheels replacing a horse and wagon. When creating an innovation, such as implementing an incentive plan, complaints will come. That’s a guarantee. If you aren’t getting complaints or “concerns”, then nothing is changing and the status quo remains. Too often, we’ve seen leaders get one or two complaints and jump to the “where there’s smoke” conclusion and as a result end implementation of most new initiatives within 90 days. Pretty soon your reputation will precede you and the status quo protectors will prevail. The best option is to give your managers the ability to deal with the complaints. At the same time, make sure your senior leadership is on board and speaking positively.
The Solution
Recognize the excuses and understand how each of them will undermine your ability to lead. Surround yourself with a strong team that is unified around the culture and vision. Empower your senior team, keep your focus on protecting the culture, and have one or two core scores that are leading indicators of where the organization is headed. An incentive plan based on cross-sells is an example of an ideal core score. Finally, when you feel the urge to make that next excuse, just STOP IT!
