Steve Riddle presents the REOWN model for accountability: Relationships, Expectations, Observations, Why/Impact, and Measurement. Leaders often think their teams understand expectations, but surveys show team members feel unclear. The model uses questions and paraphrasing to confirm understanding and build self-accountability.
Hi, it's Steve Riddle from CoachStation. Today I want to talk a little bit about accountability and one of the important facets of accountability, which is clarity of expectation setting. One of the things I've learned over the years through coaching and leading many, many people and teams is that we believe we provide greater clarity of expectations than in actual practice that we do. And we know that to be true because surveys show us that when we ask our leaders about how accountable they are and how much accountability they have within their teams, and also related to that, how clarity of expectation sits within their team, they will often say that they believe their team members are all very clear about what's expected of them. When we speak to the same team members and ask them similar questions or have a similar conversation, the answer can be quite different. And so as a consequence, I created the REOM model, which is an acronym. It stands for Relationships, Expectations, Observations, the Why or Impact, and the Measurement. And it's ultimately a leadership model, or really an accountability model. But what I've learned to be true, and I think most of you hearing this and listening today would be in agreement, that it's very hard for someone to hold themselves accountable or for us to hold them accountable without real clarity of expectations in the first place. So the RIOME model seeks to overcome that without making it all about a model for model's sake. It does step you through a 5-step process that does assist with accountability and the clarity of expectations. So the first step is about relationships, and leadership and relationships are intertwined, but it's very difficult to be an effective leader and to have any real accountability if you don't have a Pretty substantial relationship in the first place. We're not talking about a friendship, so this is not about beer on a Friday night. This is about a trusted relationship where we can talk about whatever is required or whatever is most important without fear of avoidance or any other behaviour which is not going to encourage ownership from the, from the employee. So when we've got that cornerstone of a strong relationship, we then talk about the expectations. And when we talk about expectations, what's interesting to me is initially, obviously, when you're working with someone in the first few months, you need to be doing a lot of the talking and you need to be sharing a lot of what the expectations are, both corporate-wise, both as a KPI and a set of measurements, but also your expectations as a leader. But the expectations must be understood, and the only way that I've found that you can really get a clarity of expectations i.e., has the employee really understood what's being asked of them and do they think that they can follow through on that, is if we ask the question something like, in your words, tell me what I've asked you to do or what you've agreed to do today. And again, that re-clarification and the paraphrasing back will give you a sense of clarity or understanding about what they heard, because what we do find is that just because we've delivered it and we've verbalised the expectations, it of course doesn't mean that it's been heard or interpreted the way that we intended it to do. The biggest mistake that many leaders make is that we think we need to be telling people about how they've gone against that set of expectations or about the thing we asked or agreed to do. I would argue that the vast majority of the times, the more effective way to work with it is to be asking the question initially. So how do you feel you've gone today? Or how do you feel you went last week when you we're working through that expectation. And again, depending on the criteria and the word, you're probably not using expectations so commonly, but you're talking about the team meeting or you're talking about the behaviour or whatever the expectation was related to. And again, as the conversation progresses, of course you'll have the opportunity to provide your feedback. So observations aren't just about self-observation, they're also about what you've observed and what you've seen. The 4th element there is the why or impact, and ultimately that's That's really about context. And the context there is to make sure that we're clear, both parties, both you and the employee, a team member, are clear about why we're talking about this. And it could be because we've agreed that you wanted to, in a few years' time, be a team leader. And so I'm starting to expose you to different processes along the way that will provide you with greater business acumen or skills to lead that to that point where you're more capable of being a team leader. or at least put yourself in the running for that, for one example. But it's important to talk about the reasons why we're talking about this. And the final step is about measurement. If we've got agreement and understanding, it can be just as powerful as any formal KPI or numerical measure. Once the expectation is set and agreed, it's been set and agreed. It doesn't necessarily need to be something that has a numerical reference. So that's the 5 steps of the REAL model. So the relationships, and the trust that comes along with that. The expectations and clarity, and we ask questions to clarify. The observations, again, we ask more than we tell with that regard, certainly in the early stages of the observation section where we're asking how they feel they've gone, and then we provide our feedback along the way. We ensure that their why or the impact or context is very clear and there's not— the message hasn't been lost because of a lack of clarity there. And we talk about the measurements, so what are the outputs or the results How do we know that that expectation has been met? So that's the REOWN model and your opportunities to hold people accountable and more importantly for them to hold themselves accountable based on something more substantial. So as is always the case, happy to talk further with anyone that wishes to reach out or contact me and my team at Coach Station. We're happy to walk through this a little further and this is one of the fundamental steps of all of the coaching and mentoring that we do with any of our clients. The REOWN model sits very comfortably in that space.
