Management Excellence Includes Clearly Communicating Expectations

It is common knowledge that effective communication is tantamount to success as a manager, but did you know that recent research shows that 70% of a manager’s job is communicating??

Here are examples of good and bad management communications, excerpted from my Executive Guide, “7 Costly Mistakes Executives Make the Cause Productivity, Performance, and Profits to Suffer.”

Managers and even senior executives can have an expectation of an employee, or a department, that is not EXPLICIT but is implied. It lives in the attitude, the tone of voice, not in the spoken words. These expectations are little poison pills that create a subtle, damaging blame game. “He said.” “She said.” “That’s not my job.”

This blame game results in shutting people down. They stop talking and start sabotaging, sometimes unintentionally, sometimes intentionally. The relationship degradation is, unfortunately, more common that you would think.

A friend recently recounted a situation where he understood that he had been brought in at a peer level by a contract organization, working with a woman project manager who was treating him as a subordinate. In his view, she is neither his superior nor his boss. As he said it, “She clearly does not understand that, and I am about to tell her the next time she steps over the line where to…. but I know my politics and I’ll do that through our mutual contractor boss.”

John did not believe when he agreed to sign on as VP of Technology that he was getting into a “for better or worse” commitment. His intent and expectation were to do good work and receive support so he could continue to do more good work…and to grow as a valued participant in the business.

Similarly, Mary, the CEO assumed output, cooperation, commitment, and loyalty without having to guide and assist John. After all, John was the chief technologist, not her.? But John kept running into roadblocks, procedures and systems that prevented him from doing what he felt should be done. He overcame some but obstacles for which he received no support or helping hand from Mary, as she preferred to work on corporate governance rather than technical or operational issues.

His psychological contract with Mary was broken. The problems festered and others got added. Soon John “hated” coming to work every day and could hardly wait to go home to escape the pain and frustration.

?And Mary only saw John’s non-performance to her undefined expectations. Rather than uncover the issues for examination and resolution, John received added scrutiny and Mary focused her expectations higher, finding even more shortcomings, like a self-fulfilling prophecy. Her hopes for John were dashed.

?John soon left the company and went on to be a star technologist at a competitor. Mary blamed John for not performing up to expectations and spent another $100,000 recruiting and hiring his replacement. Perhaps the new hire will read her mind and do better.

An Example of Effectively Communicating Expectations

One senior executive succinctly expressed the value of communicating expectations when he said, “There are two things I always told my direct reports and those I was about to hire.

1. Never, ever lie to me. If you do, you can’t work for me.

2. If you make a mistake, tell me first. We’ll work together to fix it. I’ve got your back. If you hide it or deceive me, you’re on your own.

“For these reasons, and some others related to knowing your people and showing them you care about them as people, not just workers doing a job, my teams would move mountains for me. They would work all hours of the day or night or weekend when we had to complete a project, overcome a setback, or rescue a customer. The point is not how much or how hard we worked, but that we were a team, and we believed in each other, supported each other, and each played our role on the team to the benefit and achievement of everyone on the team.”

?Costs of Not Communicating Expectations

If left untended, the results manifest as silos, lack of cooperation, additional upsets, outbreaks of frustration, perhaps even anger which damages productivity in its wake.

Actions to bring Excellence

First, look within to see if you are expecting something but you have not clearly communicated it. Be responsible for having not been clear (which will be addressed later in the Executive Guide as its own mistake). When the “energy” is not right between you and someone else, stop and ask clarifying questions of the person who works for you. Ask questions like, “There seems to be something between us, do you know what it is?”

Most of us have experienced some of both; the excellence and the lack thereof. If you have a story to tell, anonymous is fine, just share for the learning opportunity for all!

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Pamela Stambaugh, MBA, President and Founder of Accountability Pays Inc., is an ICF certified executive coach. Accountability Pays Inc. is a certified woman-owned business.

?In 2023, Pamela created Success Accelerators for Time-Challenged Leaders?, a digital leadership mindfulness course. A second course, Pro-Leadership Mastery, is a six-month leadership development program for senior and emerging leaders.

?Pamela regularly provides two webinars that support leadership growth and development; “7 Must-Do’s to Level Up your Leadership” and “Adaptive Capacity; What?? Blind Spots?”