Link Building 1. Understanding needs

The connection between people is fundamental for effective company function. Every day, each individual within an organization has dozens if not hundreds of microinteractions with their peers that impact thoes connections.

When you are in a position of leadership, every single one of these interations is either building or breaking down trust. Trust is a critical component of any human connection, and it's amazing how quickly it can errode.

I've recently spent some time reflecting on my experiences within companies at varying levels of leadership, as well as what I've seen on display in client companies. These are some of my personal viewpoints on what can build strong interpersonal links within teams, and what can break them.

As a was writing this series, I realized that it was getting quite long so I've broken it into multiple parts. I will link to them across posts when I've written them, but this is the first one.

Need recognition through action #

Every person in a company has needs. No two people's needs are the same, no matter how similar their work or job title. The only way to know the needs of an individual is to ask them.

As you might anticipate, the direct "what needs do you have that I can help with?" won't (often) give you a candid answer: power dynamics exist and trust is not the default. Even if they know what they need, they might not know how to work you into the equation: you've just added to their cognitive workload the task of finding a way for you to help them. Nobody is going to thank you for that.

You can sometimes get the right information by asking tangental questions. Ask them about their current projects, and drill into areas where they feel like there are challenges. Ask how the team they are a part of is doing, and how they are finding working with the group. Check in on their current interests and where they'd like to grow either professionally or personally.

Action is key. When you identify the need and possible solution, instinct might be to let them know that you noticed: you care, and you're going to fix everything. It is always valuable to get feedback on solutions, but do so when you're ready and able to make it happen otherwise you've broken the link more than you've strengthened it.

Guidance, Challenge, Recognition Loops #

Often times a team member's needs correlate to their growth professionally. Regardless of the specifics, growth often comes in a never ending loop of guidance, challenge, and recognition.

Guidance #

Guidance can be surprisingly tricky: it is essentially codefining the next step in someone's career path in a way that aligns with the company's goals. Good guidance requires knowing both, and then being able to form a cohesive next step.

Challenge #

Challenges are ways to create action out of the plan. Challenges should be defined clearly, time constrained, and have a strong success indicator. Often times matching the right challenge to the right person in a timely manner is the hardest part. If you push them to take on something that is a bit too far out of reach, you've definitely shown you don't know them or their needs well enough.

Recognition #

Different people are motivated by a variety of things, but almost everyone is motivated by a sense of equity and fairness. Recognition is both praise and compensation, both of which need to be communicated with care. Knowing what praise to give and when depends on each person, especially when considering communicating praise publicly.

Team members will share recognition with their peers, including compensation, regardless of any sort of company policy. If your team doesn't have clear advancement frameworks, don't know what the organization's goals are, or how they fit into the picture, you're in trouble. These side conversations go from sharing good news between co-workers to trust being broken and resentment forming without you even being in the room.

Safety versus comfort #

This was a big failure point for me many times during my time managing teams. I would spend a lot of time making the team feel comfortable, when what I really needed to be doing is making them feel safe.

What is the difference? Comfort can not always be guarateed, but safety should be. Most challenges that lead to growth require some level of discomfort: can I meet this goal? Will I be able to deliver what I said I would?

Safety is ensuring that even in uncomfortable situations they will be shielded from harm. When you are in a challenging situation, there is always potential for failure. Failure can be harmful. The more you can limit the harm to the person, the more likely they are to take on the challenges both you and they need them to take on.

Harm related to taking risks could be experiencing ridicule, have their job jeopardized, or having their career path derailed. Make sure that people know that they are protected when they stick their neck out to try new things.

There are many other forms of harm, especially for marginalized people. Taking the time to educate yourself on the unique ways each individual person on your team might experience harm in your workplace is a never ending task. This can be an uncomfortable topic.

It can feel like failure is inevitable, uncontrollable, and devastating. It is also extremely rewarding when you create spaces for people to do their best work. You can see how quickly people and organizations grow when barriers are lifted and team members aren't derailed.

Consistently demonstrate understanding of group interests #

Leaders, especially those in mid level positions, are brokers between corporations and people. Broker is intentional framing here: you are often negotiating needs and balancing needs between the two groups. Bluntly, whenever there are stakeholders and workers and those two groups aren't a circle, incentives are hard to align.

Regardless of opinions on (or inclinations towards) dismantling or reinforcing capitalism, this is the reality for many companies. Leaders in between these positions will feel like they are caught between a rock and a hard place.

Most of the time, team members just that you are aware of the tensions at play and that you're always consistently to find the balance and bring their interests to the table.

These are just some thoughts around using an understanding of needs to help build strong links with your teams. These are just my experiences, not universal ones. I will try to add to this series in due time.

-- Jesse