When Good People Are Bad People...

When Good People are Bad People

In general, I don’t like using the term “good” and “bad”. It is because my grandparent used to say “there is so much good in the worst of us and so much bad in the best of us that it ill behooves most of us to talk about the rest of us”.

However, for illustration and clarity, I am going to use those two terms.

The reality is that very few people wake up in the morning and say to themselves, “I am going to do something bad today.” I would agree perhaps 1% or whatever of the populace may do this, but it is a low number where I don’t need to over focus or spend a lot of time worrying about it.

Therefore, I lock my car, don’t wander around certain areas at 2am in the morning etc. Common sense fixes much, although not all, of the risk of encountering those people.

Vastly more damage is done by people with good intentions that do not fully think through what is happening and communicate “around the matter” instead of going to the heart of the matter.

In a conversation with a client recently, they may lose the relationship with one of their primary vendors. Late in 2020, there was disagreement on how the vendor was doing certain things and it was never communicated. Assumptions were made.

Only recently was there a conversation where the issues were brought to the light.

However, 11 months of “doing the wrong thing without being told” has the customer and supplier at odds. Negative emotions are running high and thoughtfulness and logic has been pushed to the side. The cost to fix this by either side problematic.

Can the relationship be recovered? I don’t know.

I am certain though if last November one of my clients employees had a conversation with the

supplier, it would have been worked out and the relationship would have realigned with little cost and pain to anyone.

You might say this is a case of some good people, or a good team, doing bad things. They did not communicate as soon as something seemed off.

Now it may be too late to recover. This will be to the detriment of both sides.

In another case, a leader in a company was struggling with a direct report, and they were not

being direct about “what” result they wanted and were not directive in “how” it would best be achieved.

It appears that this relationship has tension, negative emotion, that is so built up, that it may be irretrievable. The employee will most likely leave.

As in most studies, people don’t quit companies, they leave their boss. Being a “soft” boss

makes everyone feel good for awhile, but eventually it leads to non-performance.

And to be clear, I am not talking about being harsh. I am talking about recognizing good

performance and strengths as well as being direct about the behaviors and results that will lead an employee to the next level of capabilities.

Every employee should have a clear path to the next level, regardless of whether they are a superstar or struggling. Every vendor and customer I believe should have a clear path to a better relationship. Every day our competitors are improving.

To compete in business and have better lives, everyone (whether they are individuals,

teams, or organizations) should have a clear path to a better future with us.

It does take more energy to do this, but over 2 years, your business, people and enjoyment of

what you do will be incredibly better.

If in doubt, talk about it and ask questions to get to the heart of the matter. What are the

patterns and beliefs getting in the way of your organization producing stellar results?

We as leaders owe that to the world!

Are you doing that?

If you are frustrated, confused or intensely desire to do that, give us a call! -Don Hadley, Applied Vision Works 919-919-368-9008