Influence and Impact. George B. Bradt

employee as underperforming.

      We try to get our managers to give us what we think we need, or what has worked for us in the past. But as a supervisor once advised, “Bill, you'll be much happier if you figure out what your supervisor is good at and learn that. Trying to get your supervisor to give you what you think you need to learn is much more frustrating.”

      Focusing on Your Team

People often attribute problems at work to the people who work for them. Just as employees tend to blame their managers for many problems, managers tend to think that failures or misses are due to “weak players” and look for ways to replace them. Both authors have known managers who have an endless cycle of replacing team members, all at once or one at a time, never stopping to think that the problem may be themselves instead of their team.

      Replacing team members may be necessary, particularly when a new leader comes into a role and has a different vision, strategy, or mandate than the prior one. At some point it is the job of a leader to make the most of the people they have rather than continuously blaming the individuals for what is actually their own responsibility. The manager's manager and others start to notice this pattern of blaming the team members, and the problem with the team becomes a problem with the manager. Before long, the organization is looking for a new leader, rather than new players.

      Focusing on Your Company

      Just as there are managers whom no one can work for, and teams that need to be replaced, there are companies whose vision, culture, and values are either objectively wrong, or wrong for you. When you find yourself working for a company that is focused on self-enrichment, and your values lead you to provide for others, you may need to consider moving on. However, attributing difficulties in your job performance to the company may mask the difficulties you have in adapting to the environment you are in. You may be externalizing responsibility for your own difficulty accepting that we all have to adapt to our environment to survive. Keep in mind that, unless you are in a position of significant authority, you are not likely to substantively change the company you work for.

Why Externalizing Rarely Works

      Attributing responsibility to others severely limits your options. If you see the difficulties as lying outside of what you are doing and how you are doing it, you can only do two things: Try to get the “other” to change or find a better “other.” The former is difficult, because the others feel blamed, which makes them angry, hurt, and defensive. Moreover, the behaviors you find problematic likely have been working for them. The latter is time-consuming, and you have no guarantee that a new job is going to give you a better experience than your current one.

      By contrast, assuming responsibility for finding a solution to feeling like you aren't succeeding gives you a wide range of options to develop and demonstrate your value. Even if you do decide that the current situation needs to be changed, we recommend spending some time making sure you are doing what is really needed to succeed before jumping ship.

Getting Unstuck

      In summary, many of our efforts to contribute to the organization paradoxically cause us to lose influence and impact. We try to do more, or do what we know best, or what feels safe, unconsciously leading us to detract from our value and weaken our impact. The actions we take are a response to our attitudes, emotions, and underlying beliefs about ourselves, others, and our organizational context. The good news is that you have the ability to turn the tables and increase your agency and effectiveness. What you prioritize, where you and your team focus attention, and how you act, respond, and communicate can be changed to make it clear you are aligned to your manager, your function and the organization.

      To be clear, there are times when the feeling of being stuck has nothing to do with you. You may be in a bad situation or there is a difference in values or style that cannot be overcome. Until you find that out, however, you have many more degrees of freedom when you focus on yourself. Start by framing the problem as something you can control, and change may be more actionable than trying to change others or looking for a new job. Our next chapter will make it clear how you can enhance your value to the organization, and help you expand your influence and impact on others.

       ---------------------

Key Takeaways

      Get what you want by doing what your organization needs. The one change you need to make is to shift your attention from the temptations of doing what is comfortable, what is familiar, or what you wish, to doing what is most important to the organization.

End Notes

      1 i Cooley, C. H. (1992). Human nature and the social order. Transaction Publishers.; Mead, G. H. (1962). Mind, self, and society. Chicago: University of Chicago.

      2 ii Maslow, A. H. (1943). "A theory of human motivation." Psychological Review, 50: 396.; Hogan, K. (2011). The science of influence: How to get anyone to say yes in 8 minutes or less. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.; Rock, D. (2008). "SCARF: A brain-based model for collaborating with and influencing others." NeuroLeadership Journal, 1: 44–52.

      3 iii Mehrabian, A. (1981). Silent messages: Implicit communication of emotions and attitudes. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

      4 iv Bradt, G. (2019, October). As an executive onboarding into a new role, engage intellectually, emotionally and practically—in that order. Forbes. Retrieved February 7, 2021 from https://www.forbes.com/sites/georgebradt/2019/10/22/as-an-executive-onboarding-into-a-new-role-engage-intellectually-emotionally-and-practically--in-that-order/?sh=58d89f9d5be6; Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

      5 v Forester, J., & McKibbon, G. (2020). Beyond blame: Leadership, collaboration and compassion in the time of COVID-19. Socio-Ecological Practice Research, 2(3): 205–216.

      6 vi Reina, C. S., Rogers, K. M., Peterson, S. J., Byron, K., & Hom, P. W. (2018). Quitting the boss? The role of manager influence tactics and employee emotional engagement in voluntary turnover. Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies, 25(1): 5–18.