The importance of being earnest

How important are expectations to your
professional success?

In scientific research a procedure called a double blind test is used to find out if a drug treatment works. The first blind is the use of a placebo, such as a fake pill that has no medical benefit to the test subject.  This is done because people will have expectations that will cause them to get better even if the medication has no effect. This group will see improvements because of their expectations.

The second blind is that the scientists who are administering the tests do not know who is taking the placebo and who is taking the real drug.  Why?

Because trained scientists who are trying their best not to affect the outcome of the experiment will, despite their best efforts, cause the test subjects to create a certain outcome, simply by the power of their expectations!

• If the power of unintentional expectations can be this statistically significant, what effect do your expectations have on your sales people's performance?

• If the power of expectations is so strong, what effect can helping customers set reasonable expectations about the performance of advertising have on our customers’ level of satisfaction?

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Positive leadership earns results

Our mission is to remind, reinforce, and share practical, tried and tested business knowledge to print industry leaders. Focusing on positives, while holding people accountable is the way to achieve:

• Sustained performance growth
• Increased employee engagement
  
• Increase sales
• Increase customer loyalty and profits
• Decrease turnover
• Decrease cost of goods sold

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Take action

Each e-letter will encourage you to take immediate action to implement positive leadership principles. In this issue I am asking you to observe your own behavior when you interact with your team members and your colleagues.

What expectations are you setting with your employees? 

Scenario: Imagine that you are about to talk to your sales professionals about new sales targets and their required levels of performance.

Action Points:

1. Make a list of the specific words you generally use to convey the sales and activity outcomes you expect from your sales team.  Do this quickly, just write down all the words that come to mind, do not edit your thoughts.
   
2. Imagine that you can see yourself talking to your team.
   
3. Are the words you use to verbally communicate consistent with your non-verbal communications such as tone of voice, body language, posture and facial expressions?
   Are you saying one thing with your words but communicating something different with your actions?  YES / NO
   
4. How do you generally feel when communicating with your sales professionals?
   Are you rushed, frustrated, nervous, funny, relaxed,
5. On a scale of 1 (low) to 10 (high) do you convey respect for your employees?
   Do you enjoy working with them?  Do you expect them to succeed?
   
6. How would you rate your positive leadership skills with your team as a whole? 
   With each team member as an individual?
   
7. Are there individuals in your team that may be receiving a mixed message from you? 
   Who? 
   
8. Are there occasions that you may convey that you expect certain individuals to fail?
   If so, take a moment to reflect on each individual and write down a list of emotional reactions you have when communicating with them, for example, you do not like the way the talk....
9. Now make another list of specific work related actions that you have observed yourself that may be causing negative reactions in you, for example, they consistently make spelling mistakes.
   
10. Now I want you to focus only on the second list. Review the list of work related topics and next to each topic note a solution. How can you help the individual improve on their professional performance?
    
11. Observe whether or not your employees (your customers) have clear and positive expectations for their own productivity. What evidence do you see?

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