124: When to Move From Coaching to Performance Management as a Leader

Are you working harder at someone else's success than they are? Then you're going to want to listen to this episode. Welcome back, everyone, to another episode of the Reality Based Leadership Podcast. I'm Alex Dorr, CEO at Reality Based Leadership, and I'm really looking forward to today's episode because it's inspired by a recent session that I had with a group that was trying to figure out how to take all of the reality-based leadership work we had done for almost a year and continue to figure out the best way to use the tools, or at what moments do I use this coaching technique and not this one, and how do I take this situation that's stuck and coach the person beyond it. And it sparked a lesson that's the center of this whole podcast, which is if you are continuously trying to figure out how to motivate or get someone to move into the space that the organization or the business needs them, you might be in a different conversation than what I would call reality-based leadership coaching. And there's a dirty little secret that I don't think I've talked about enough on this podcast or in our content, is that all of the tools, the techniques that we write about in Reality-Based Leadership and all of our business books, in my most recent book, How We Could, These tools really only work with the willing, those that are open to coaching, those that are leaning in to what the organization's trying to do. And I don't want to, because I speak on drama, lean too far into a bias that there's a lot of this happening and it's rampant. But I also always have to look at the stats that nearly 70% of America is disengaged at work. So, I think more of this lack of willingness Is it's more common than I think. And so, today's episode is really about when do you know when to coach and use what we teach on this podcast in Reality-Based Leadership and the newsletters we put out and the books that I write. When can you use these techniques and these tools? And then, when is it past that point where it's more straight-up time for a performance management conversation? And this became the session that I designed. So, what I wanted to do is bring back the insights And the takeaway from that session and give it to all of you. If you've ever struggled with why isn't the coaching working, why aren't some of these techniques helping in a situation, it's because we might be out of the coaching realm and getting in more to performance management. And so what I have here is just some of the slides from that session and then a great tool for you that I call the Performance Coaching Agreement that you can download and take from this session. And In in the session I did, they thought this performance coaching agreement—I put it at the end—which you'll see why as I walk through some of this content today—but they thought it could have been a great thing to have just as a tool or at the start. And this performance coaching agreement is just a clear way to go through where someone is not in the desired state that we're hoping for, both you as the manager and the organization and them, and then talk about what the current state is, desired state, and what the gap is, and then what's the plan to close that gap. Pretty much my. version that I would put of a good performance management conversation. So, that tool is going to be here, but we're going to get to that later in the podcast. But the main idea here is what's really going on and when do you transfer from trying to coach and use some of the reality-based leadership tools and then eventually have to get more into sometimes a more firm performance conversation. And so, the first takeaway to set up this podcast is really that coaching is impactful when someone needs awareness, clarity, or skill development in something. And when you start to coach or you're wondering why someone's in drama or not doing what is needed for the team or the organization or your business, one of the first things that I like to investigate is if the answer to like, why aren't you doing that thing I need you to do? If they're kind of like, what thing? You know, basically I thought I had asked, but I had thought about it in my head and forgot to ask you, or I thought it was clear that this is what we needed. You know, moving forward, and it wasn't clear. So, it's hard to coach on what I call skill set. Is it an approach issue? Is it a willingness issue? Notice willingness is number 3. If the first thing is like, wait, what did you need me to do? Meaning I wasn't clear as a leader or the organization that this is specifically what we needed you to do. So, coaching really works when someone is lacking that clarity or awareness that it's even a problem in the first place, or they don't have the skill, or we haven't given them the training. Or the, the, the mentorship to learn the approach that we need to be able to deliver the result we're looking for. But here's the key. Coaching doesn't work on someone lacking willingness. And a lot of the questions I get in sessions and at conferences and working with teams is, but what about this? Oh, but what about this example? Or what about this person? And as we peel back and talk about some of the tools that could be used and like, yeah, that won't work. And oh, that probably wouldn't work. And I tried that before. Some of it is, is the leader in learned helplessness? Are they just not trying something new and using information from 3 years ago that they think will backfire again? It could be some of that. A lot of times they're getting more towards someone that just simply isn't stepping up to the performance or the expectations that are needed, which would then move into that performance management conversation. So what I came up with as I was thinking through how do I make that distinction and then how do I support leaders in making that distinction is there's really a 5-step process with some elements in that 5 steps. But number 1 is we have to diagnose what's really going on. And I'll talk about what you're trying to diagnose there, but we got to figure out which one is it more of a coaching type problem or is it more a performance issue? Number 2 in that is we got to check some of the stories around what's happening for drama. Some of that's our stories, some of that's their story. And we'll talk about some tools for that. Number 3 is, is it time to coach to the conversation and not take the issue and I go and coach to the conversation where they're struggling with someone else and I take it on and go coach to the conversation myself? Where can I oftentimes connect to colleagues who are having a relationship challenge without being part of the drama triangle? So diagnose. Number 2, check the story for drama. Number 3, coach to the conversation. Number 4 is that let's address performance if it is a performance issue. And number 5 is follow-through to make sure there's that ongoing support to see if there's progress. So, that was the 5 steps to decide what's really going on, whether it's coaching or performance. So, number 1 here in diagnose, I always think underneath that I need to diagnose and look at, is it the story? Something they're believing in their head that's untrue or limiting beliefs or They're creating more drama around the situation than is needed, than is true. So, is it story? Is it relationship? Or is it performance? And these are the 3 places I like to start. So, if it's story, I don't really know if there's a problem yet with the person, like 2 people in a problem on a team or having a conflict. I don't really know if it's a real problem yet until we've looked at the story that they're telling? What are the facts versus the story? Where are they in judgment? Is, is there assignments of motive going on? Have the 2 individuals involved or the few people involved not really talked to each other? There's just a lot of speculation and unquestioned stories going on. If it's relationship, I'm thinking, is there something legitimate that 2 or more staff members, team members need to work through? And then who needs to have that conversation? I always err on the side of not taking on someone's issue and going to address it until that's needed, which might be more a performance conversation until my— as a manager, my step in is needed because wherever I can pave the path for the type of teamwork and communication where they can take care of it with each other when they're having a little bit of a disagreement, that's going to help our teamwork overall. I call it stop judging, start helping. But I don't want the judgment of another to come to me to then go talk to them about, to then come back and have them talk to the other person about. That drama triangle is, is tough. And the real question in there is always like, have these 2 individuals having the issue actually talked to each other? I know many of us know that, that half the time the issue gets solved if 2 people just go and have a conversation together. And just try and figure it out. And so sometimes we need to coach that person that's frustrated, to coach them and help them come up with a structure or a script or a starting point to have that conversation, which we'll talk about next. And then if it's performance, this might be where now it's time as a manager that it's our turn to step in. There is some additional support needed, and it might be now mine to address because this is becoming a long-term issue or a pattern that's causing a lot more chaos than needed. And so story, relationship, performance. So an example that I was working with, with the group that I was having the session with, is like a story example would be, you know, he doesn't respect me. And there'd be more on top of that, but he doesn't respect me. He always does this. This is, you know, what they— this is what he's always doing. And he's not really focused. He doesn't care about the team. Like, that's the story. The relationship Phrase you might hear is, 3 times he stepped away during our busiest period without telling me, and we haven't talked about it. So the situation here is at a busy time, they all need coverage at this, this organization. And when it gets busy, sometimes people step away or they do other things. And this colleague is having trouble with this team member that keeps stepping away when it appears to be the busiest time. And so then they're short. And then if it was a performance statement, it'd be more like we've already clarified the coverage expectation twice and the behavior continues. So he doesn't respect me. He doesn't care about the team. That might be more coaching to the story. If it's a relationship thing, it's 3 times he stepped away during our busiest period without telling me and we haven't talked about it. Now, you won't always hear we haven't talked about it. So that's one of my favorite questions is have you been able to connect and have that conversation and share what you feel? And if there's more there or they share more about why they can't do that, why they won't do that, or that's— then probably get into the next step, which is a performance issue. We've clarified the coverage expectation twice and the behavior still continues. So again, if it's a story challenge there, he doesn't respect me, we want to coach towards the thinking there because when we clean up the thinking comes next right action. comes next action without judgment, comes more benefit of the doubt. And from that clean thinking comes better teamwork. So sometimes just being able to coach that person after validating their experience on the story they have in their mind that they're telling you can go a long way. If it's a relationship piece, we really want to be coaching towards those two that are struggling with each other, those parties involved. Having the conversation themselves. So, it's helping prepare them to have the conversation, and that's hugely beneficial to stay out of the drama triangle. Or again, is it time to manage the expectation and move this into performance conversation? And so, how do you then, if it is the story, how do you coach to the thinking? Well, some of you already know, and I'll link the tool below. I call this the Edit Your Story tool. And this tool is so simple. As someone shares What's going on, the situation, you know, it depends on the relationship. But if they have some exposure to you being a reality-based leader, I would encourage them to type up or write down, or even you with your journal, write down the facts that you're hearing about the story. Or sometimes I draw a line down the middle of my piece of paper, and after I draw a line right down the middle, on the left side I put the facts, on the right side I separate out The judgments, the assignments of motive, the stories we can't know to be true, some of that extreme language like, he doesn't respect me. So, I would write down 3 times he stepped away during a busy time. That would be on the left side. But on the right side, I would put, and he doesn't respect us and he doesn't care about the team. I would put that on the right side because we don't know that to be true yet. So, I would start to tease out what are the facts and the behaviors from the story or the judgments or the assignments of motive that the team's adding on. This just helps to separate and simmer down that ego. So we're not adding an untrue story on top of the situation to make it even worse. We're so far from giving someone the benefit of the doubt and being able to have that conversation if I'm walking into the conversation with a big, furious story on top of it with judgments and speculation, all those things. So that's where you write down the story or you support them in writing down the story. And then here's the big questions behind it. Self-reflection is what you want to drive here is what do we know for sure? Do we know all that for sure? What are we assuming? Is there anything we're assuming in this behavior here? What are we doing that is getting us into judgments or assignments of motive? And then what are simply the facts? That's this first exercise. And that's the first check. We want to make sure that the story isn't the bigger part of the problem. And sometimes getting through that Someone can simmer down, they feel supported, and then they can go specifically ask for what they need or clarify, you know, what the concern is. Now, some of you are thinking that ain't going to be enough. That probably is not going to do it. There'll still be the problem there. There'll still be the, you know, the repeated offense there. So then it might be time to move into what is step 3, coaching towards the conversation. This is more about coaching towards the relationship. And one of my favorite tools And we use it for different— a different type of coaching. I call it the feedback frame, and I can also link a video here in the show notes. But essentially, if you can imagine, it's just 4 boxes. And I love because it's going to be some sort of feedback that you want to keep this very short. We don't want it to be like one of the team members is dumping, you know, their frustration on another team member, but we want to really have a structure To start to help that person acknowledge that they're frustrated and then ask specifically for what they need with curiosity and with that spirit of making things better together and benefit of the doubt. And so I call it the feedback frame. And the whole idea here is don't overmanage as a leader or referee what the staff or your team members can solve themselves. The moment you get into the position of the referee or you overmanage and underlead, it'll become a pattern that is so hard to break moving forward, where whenever there's a problem or personality conflict or there's a little bit of disagreement, it's got to come through you to go address the other person and then bring it back. And you're just— you're in that dynamic and it's hard to get out of. And so how do you coach that conversation? And the feedback frame, it really has these 4 steps that you want to write down with them to answer. And so my— each one has a question to really prompt you to get this written down with the individual. So I'd bring them in and as we're talking, say, I think it's time. I think this is something you're going to want to bring up with them directly. And I'm here to help you get prepared to be able to do this because I think you can really find a breakthrough and come together with this team member if we do this. And so in the first box, step 1 is what do you value about working with this person? Like, what are they doing that's working? What can you genuinely acknowledge about their character, about certain things about the way they work that you enjoy? And the idea is this helps someone simmer down to realize that someone's not all good and not all bad, or that other person or group or department's not out to, like, sabotage you. And so what do you value about working with them? And just write that in one sentence, like, what's working right now? Now, the second step's where it gets a little juicier is what isn't working yet. And this is where you share as cleanly as you can, here's what's not working yet, which in this case would be whenever it seems to get busy around this time of week or this time of day, you tend to go out over to break or take your break at that moment, and it leaves the rest of us behind with lack of coverage. And so that's where you specifically say what happened, what you saw, and you're just trying to stick to observable behaviors and not really do a lot of accusing, but just almost labeling what you tend to notice or what you've been seeing. Now, step 3 is you really wanna, at step 3, ask what you might be missing and what could be another explanation. Or I like to open it up to the other person. Like, this is where it becomes a conversation. Help me understand, or how close am I? Like, help me understand What you tend to see happens there, what I might be missing. So, I'm doing a little bit of reflection on what I might be missing, and then it opens it up to the other person to say, help me understand what else might be going on that I'm not seeing in step 3. And then step 4 is, what would great look like moving forward for both of us as a team? And this is where be sure to ask, what specifically do you need to see differently? What do you need them to do? And this is where we take the insights and the coming together from step 3, and we move into what would great look like, and then how can we both commit to that? And I like to keep it where, what can they do that would adjust in their behavior, and then what can I do to support that? I love that shared accountability here. And so, that is a way to— if you just have a sentence or 2 for each one of those, then it's just finding a way to schedule some time or a quick coffee or a walk or a A quick chat for those 2 to come together and have this discussion about what is the challenge and the person walking away when it's a busy time when they don't have coverage. So that's the tool. It's like a feedback frame, just one sentence for each of those 4 steps. What do you value about working with this person? What's not working yet? Observable behaviors you're seeing. What could you be missing or help me understand? And that shares their perspective. And then what specifically are you asking for? This is like the what would great look like question. How can I support that? And this really is that chance to come together and hopefully from that conversation, get through it and boom, we're on to the next thing. There's some awareness there and it might not go perfectly right after. This won't maybe solve it all, but it is a way to have those 2 colleagues come together and you're just facilitating that discussion. Now, if that's been done, the story piece isn't working, it might be where we're moving into more of this is a straight-up performance issue where they continuously repeat the same behavior. It's been brought up. For that, this part of the session, this is where you're getting into the danger zone where your team, you, their colleagues are all working harder at this person's success than they are. We're trying to coach, we're trying to try all of our techniques and it's not working. And this is where we move into step 4, which is actually addressing a clear performance issue. And as I was getting ready for this workshop, I was thinking of what are the main questions I like to ask when it's time for a manager to step in and really start to have that performance conversation clear and kind about what's going on. So, it's 7 questions. The first question is, what is your goal? Or it might be in this case, what is the expectation for anyone that'd be in this role? Like, what is the clear expectation? Checking to see if they They have the expectation, or you might have to remind who's involved what is the expectation. Step 2 is, with that being the expectation, what has your approach been? Do you feel like you've been hitting that expectation? And what's your approach been? And then number 3, I love, how's that working for you? And this is where people start to see their approach and whether it's working or not and see if there's any insight there. Now, step 4 is where You offer, my observations of your approach are this. Like, my observations of your approach have been, and this is where, again, it's not judgmental. We just wanna say, these are some things that I've seen, these are some things that are helping, these are some things that are hindering, but these are my clear observations of your approach. And then number 5 is a really big question. I got it in bold here. How far off am I? Like, here's what I'm observing. I might be missing something. How far off am I? And this is where that individual might share more information than that you didn't know about. Maybe it's the other side of the story. Maybe it's where they share broader things that are happening that might be affecting performance or causing the goal not to be hit or the standard not to be met. So that how far off am I keeps this from being a lecture and actually, you know, being a, a true performance conversation where both sides are sharing their perspective on what's going on. And then from there, how far off am I is what would you like to change in your approach, given that's the expectation? And then my favorite part, as always, number 7, and what are you committing to? Or can I count on you to commit to that? And this becomes really our 7-question, almost a printout. You could have it on a note card for addressing performance. And it hits on everything you need there to see what's really going on. And that's where, as you're addressing performance, this question set is really helpful. And then at the same time, another tool, as I mentioned at the start of the podcast, that I bring at this point might be just actual documentation using the reality-based performance coaching agreement. And I'll have this again as a download for you, but it just says Performance Coaching Agreement for, you put the team member's name here, and then step 1, Is really, what does success look like? That's that expectation, that desired state. And then 2 is the current state. What is happening now? What are we observing? That's really that, you know, your observations of their approach, and you can fill this out together. Step 3 is the gap. Like, what is the main difference between the current state and the desired state? And that's the gap we're hoping to close with these conversations that are consistent conversations. And number 4, I love this. It is the critical success factors. I find that many people don't know how to close the gap on performance because they haven't been given the processes or the key actions or habits to get there. And so what must change or happen for the employee to be successful? And I still remember a franchise owner that I got to work with that's really fluent in RBL with his team. He works in his— his locations are McDonald's. Is his team loves that they're able to take some of those roles. And for people that join, he's able to break those down into 4 or 5 habits that you do every single day, and you will consistently hit the metrics that help the location thrive. Now, I know all roles and all jobs aren't able to, like a franchise like a McDonald's, possibly have everything dialed in that clear. But if we're able to find a few critical success factors or habits that people can commit to, that seems more doable than just a big gap in the outcome you're hoping to see without a process to get there. It's that process focus versus outcome focus. And then number 5 is big. What you measure actually changes or doesn't. And so, what are the measurements, the metrics? How will we know the expectation is being met? If you can find something to measure in either their behavior, it can be qualitative, but it's best probably to have it— Quantitative. quantitative, like a dashboard or some real results, but can we measure progress? And that helps both sides to see if what we're focused on as a manager, as an organization, is helping. And then we all want to make progress in our day-to-day as a person, as, you know, in our career. And so that will help, you know, in this process here. And then number 6 are what are the key accountabilities? What is the employee responsible for? And then what support will you as the manager provide? And I always like to add that more at the end is what are you willing to do? And then what can I do to support that? So this isn't me doing all of the heavy lifting to be able to get someone to where the organization needs them to be. So it's shared accountability there. And then at the end of this, this template here, you'll see that it has an action plan, which is what specifically will happen next, by when, And where— when will we follow up? And what I love is this, you just follow the template. It hits on basically all those questions we just asked before, and it gets it written down. It's now out of our heads, it's documented, and we can see progress here. And we have a follow-up plan, so this doesn't become a great conversation that seems like progress, and then we forget to follow up because we get busy. And so that's the performance coaching agreement. And this This has been a tool that's been highly downloaded because one thing I think we at Reality-Based Leadership often don't focus on, you know, performance conversations, because there's so many other programs out there for performance management. That's not really our sweet spot. We have some good tools for it, but we're usually coaching on top of those systems. And I've seen some groups that I've worked with recently don't have a lot of that formal or consistent performance coaching conversations to get into as much of the reality-based leadership mindset, limiting beliefs conversations that we teach in the programs. So that's why I thought this was a really interesting session to do with, with the teams. As a final reflection, if you're thinking about your teams and doing a bit of an audit of who maybe is definitely open to coaching, where coaching is still the move, And then maybe you got someone as you listen to this podcast that you feel like you're working harder at their success than they are. You're up, you know, losing sleep at night, or you're racking your brain to how to figure out the next step to support them. And, you know, you're waking up pretty tired and they're showing up when you see them at the office, the hospital, you know, virtually, and they are pretty refreshed. You might be dripping into that danger zone of working harder at their success than they are. Maybe it's time to look at what is that performance conversation that needs to be had. So, in wrapping up the podcast today, the big question is, what conversations are you currently avoiding as a leader? And where are you stepping in when it should be a conversation you're helping to facilitate between 2 team members instead of getting pulled into really that drama triangle where you are the one responsible for solving an issue that they could— do themselves. So, where are you getting into that referee mode? And then lastly, for something that's going on, I always think story, relationship, performance. You know, where am I stuck in a story? Where is this individual stuck in a story? Is that really the problem? What have I tolerated that I'm now frustrated by is a great question to sit with. Where have I overfunctioned or rescued another team member? Is it mine to manage or theirs to work through? That's a question I'm often walking with? Is it mine to manage, where maybe it's time for me as a leader to step in because this has gotten into a performance issue and they've tried to handle it together and they just are unable to? Or is it theirs to still work through? And lastly, from all of this, as you're reflecting after this podcast, as you're driving, as you're walking, as you're running, as you're just listening in, what is your next right conversation with the situation that this podcast has most brought to your mind? What is the next right conversation? Take a moment to write down whether it's story, relationship, or performance based on your initial analysis of it, and then write down when you're going to have that conversation. The longer you avoid it, the more we enable it, the worse it gets. So, be sure to write that down. You got this. You got some tools that you can grab from this podcast to be able to diagnose and figure out how to help next. You can do this. Keep ditching the drama. You got what you need here. Coaching, or is it performance management? Now you know what to do. Go be great. I'll see you on the next episode.