Thursday, May 17, 2012

Facilitating Change- A top Down Process


Facilitating intact teams is always an interesting experience. An entire team and sometimes entire departments come into the session, carrying their unique power dynamics, conflicts and silos. Add to this the presence of the top boss and what you get is a potentially volatile situation that needs all the presence and awareness a facilitator can muster.

What happens at work is always reflected in the classroom. Leaders believe that the problem is down below, wiser men know otherwise. The functioning of a team is a direct reflection of the leader leading it.  
At the conclusion of a recent workshop with an IT Department of an Organization, the functional Head invited me to his cabin to discuss his team. He sought feedback on his people. After having identified his top three ‘problem people’ he also realized that they were also his top performing guys. Having overheard various snatches of conversation during the session and seen the way the team reacted to this leader I had realized that the problem could lay elsewhere.
We discussed strategies to manage his people and then I asked him a casual open ended question, “What is your equation with your team?” My intention was to steer the conversation in his direction and assess his openness to feedback. To the leader’s credit, after a long pause, he admitted that he wished things were better with his team.
The next question I asked him led to an Aha moment for him. I asked, “How does your team feel in your presence?"
While answering the second question what the functional head realized was that his team felt insecure under his leadership, because they perceived that he got routinely bulldozed by other functional heads and hence could not secure the resources his team expected
What followed was one of the most heartfelt and honest conversation I have ever had with a leader. When the readiness is there the solutions appear. Genuine change is only possible then. The road ahead for this introvert leader maybe uphill but I believe he will get there because of his strong will to improve. A trait that has taken him this far…

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