When Not to Focus on Results
In a recent coaching session, a client realized that what would be most helpful to them in their leadership role was actually to NOT focus on results. Here’s why.
This leader had been really good at setting goals. Sometimes big, audacious ones, sometimes more realistic ones. The job of a goal is to motivate us, and while these goals did that for a while, the motivation would consistently die out, usually due to some environmental change outside of the client's control that rendered those goals no longer quite on target.
So what happened in our session was that this leader came ready to accept the reality of their situation and that they weren't where they had wanted to be by now. They were in a place of raw honesty with themselves. They were at peace with the idea that nothing may change in their work results externally for another six months, maybe longer.
The client was ready to work on the inside. They'd had success in their personal life focusing on values, specifically the value of health. They let that value infuse their everyday choices and voila, results sustainably came over time.
The client wanted to translate this success into their work life. So we coached around the question of what are three values of a healthy business? (Depending on your role, it might be three values of a healthy organization, department, or team.)
After identifying the first two, the client suggested that the third value be "results". My coaching intuition felt a red flag right away and I pushed back.
"If you focus on operating in alignment with your values for running this business, the results will come in their own time." It wasn't appropriate in this framework to have results be listed as one of the values, even though sure, who doesn't value results?!
The values being defined needed to be values-in-use rather than espoused values, guiding nuanced, everyday choices about how to prioritize time and activities. And with many business development actions, seeds are sown that may not sprout for months, so adding “results” to the list risked putting this client back on the hamster wheel they'd been on for the past few years. The values needed to create an expansive mindset that allowed for more freedom and creativity while still offering guidance.
Remember, no matter where the leader is in the matrix, they are always tuned in to know if they should transition to another area. So even when the leader deliberately pulls back, they remain aware enough that they’ll know when it’s time to dive back into the detail or step up and lead the way.
