Employing Differences, Episode 81: Who's gonna do this?

Paul: 0:08

Welcome to Employing Differences, a conversation about exploring the collaborative space between individuals.

Karen: 0:14

I'm Karen Giming.

Paul: 0:15

And I'm Paul Tevis.

Karen: 0:17

Each episode, we start with a question and see where it takes us. This week's question is, "Who's gonna do this?"

Paul: 0:25

So one of the fun things about the work that I do with teams and in organizations is that we get to decide who's gonna do what. Now, we get to decide, and we have to decide. Those are the two sides of the coin here. The historical way that organizations operate is that it's very segmented and defined what the roles are, who does what. And one of the things that we've been finding over the last number of decades is that you can't from the beginning know exactly who should do what tasks. Because people are not interchangeable. You can hire to a job description, you can bring people into sort of defined roles, but then you also have to have flexibility in order to get things to match up right with people's skills. We've talked some about that before. And there's a tension that exists in this, where we want to create enough clarity about who is going to take care of what particular tasks so that we can move forward. But we don't want to be overly rigid in saying,"This task is always going to be done by the person with this role, this task is going be done by a person with this role." And so we want to have some flexibility around how to do that. How do we adapt it? And it's very easy to fall too far to either one of the ends of that spectrum. And so one of the things Karen and I want to explore a little bit today here is, how do we help groups figure out who is going to do what in a way that isn't just spinning in circles for forever trying to figure it out? How do we strike that right balance between clarity and flexibility, between timeliness of decisions and making sure that all the voices get heard. All the things that we always talk about in group decision making sorts of things. So, Karen, in groups that you work with, how do you help people figure out who's gonna do what?

Karen: 2:25

So I think the first piece that you're already pointing to is making sure that you have a culture where the information that would help you figure it out is likely to be known and shared. If you have a traditional corporate culture where you got hired for this job, and that's what you do, and you stay in your box, and you put out your widgets, and that's what you do, then you have a fair chance of having somebody who would be amazing and excited about doing a thing and you don't even know that that's the case. And you've got somebody else over there doing it that is not all that interested and not all that great, but it's in their job description, so they're the one doing it. So I think step one is have a culture where you are talking to each other and where somebody could say safely, "I would love to be doing that thing," or, "You know, I just did this graduate course on this, and I learned about that, and would love to be involved in that way." And that doesn't mean you're going to instantly adapt or change or give everybody what they asked for, but if you don't have a space where they can safely say it, then you've got no chance of integrating that information. So the first thing is, have a space where relevant information is likely to show up. And that's both from some intentional stuff, building it into employee review systems, building it into meeting structures so that every now and again you have a structured way for people to say, "So what would you be excited about? Is there athing you'd like to be doing that you're not?" That that question's getting asked. But also just looking for, you know, all our previous 80 episodes where we talk about different ways and creating safety, so that people can say the things that they would like to say.

Paul: 4:15

Mm hmm. I think a key piece of that is creating the transparency around the whole. Because oftentimes, we may be transparent about like, "Well, these are the requirements for this job," or this is what this job description says. And those are all available, but we don't see how do those connect to each other? How do they relate to each other? What are they in the larger service of? I've worked in organizations like this before, where everybody on a team knew what their job was, but they didn't know what the job of the team was. They weren't clear about what the larger how those things were supposed to fit together was supposed to work. And so I think there's there's a way where if we're sharing information it's not just about sort of what are the predefined roles that we're currently working with and then how those might shift over time but it's also sharing the information about what's the larger sort of purpose of that collection of people. So this is things like, "What's the goal at a larger level? What is the current arrangement of roles and responsibilities? And how do each of those contribute to things?" It's very easy to lose track of certain things. They might fall into the gaps between,which is one of things we want to avoid. We've talked before about on our episode about "How is that my problem?" about how we actually need to create a picture how there's a larger piece that what you are doing in your role is contributing to solving this larger problem. And that sometimes you need to stretch outside of those normal, that normal definition in the service of the collective goal. But if we're not actually making that collective goal not only what we're trying to do, but how these roles are supposed to relate to each other transparent, then it's even harder to have that conversation and that discussion.

Karen: 6:16

Yeah. And I think another piece that is worth mentioning here is that it's not just about how the things that you're doing contribute to the broader goal. It's also about understanding how the things that you're doing actually aren't contributing at all to that larger goal. And if you don't know what that larger goal is, you can spend a lot of time spinning on, "Well, we've always done this thing. We've always had this happening. And, and I had no idea that actually that's some archaic thing, or my predecessor just did that because she likes to but it actually didn't help. You know, nobody else needed it, and now I don't need it, and I'm still doing it, because she told me to, or..." You can see how that would play out tons of different ways. So being thoughtful and again, this is a safety thing specifically. It can be tough in the wrong culture to show up and say, "I've been spending like three hours a week doing this thing that I suspect isn't actually useful. Is it useful?" And you want a culture where that kind of question is really welcomed, because the last thing you want is for me to bring that question and has to say, "Well, you're just being lazy and trying to shirk work and what's wrong with you?" Yeah, if anybody gets that kind of response, once, I can pretty much guarantee that those no longer useful tasks are just going to stay in the community culture or the corporate culture forever. So again, that being able to have those conversations and see both sides of the tasks that are being done. And to take it even one step further. Are there tasks that are not being done that are maybe essential or maybe just, "Well, if that could get done..." "Hey, Paul, if you could do this one thing that would take you like, 10 minutes, it would save me an hour every week. Would you be willing to..." That kind of thing. So lots of room for that kind of really rich conversation, and sometimes making really small changes.

Paul: 8:18

Mm hmm. There's two things in that, like, those are really kind of two topics to talk about that I like to try to prompt in a group. Because it's one thing to just rely on people bringing them up. It's another thing to draw them forth, to have a structure or to have a some regular practice that draws those things forth. And one of them is the sort of continually asking, "What are things that you're doing right now that you think you might be able to stop?" That might not need to be Yeah, I think that's really true. And, and I think there's done because of how things have changed. And so that's one is just kind of soliciting people's idea for ideas for continuous improvement, right. "How do you think we you might be able to evolve this role? You know, it has been this way. What are you seeing? What are you noticing?" and actually tapping into people's expertise in their role. They're the one in the job asking them how do you think this could be made better or easier? What are the things that you think that could stop. Of course, you need to have made the the goal, the purpose, all that larger stuff transparent, so that they have a way of answering that question in a coherent fashion. So I think one is kind of building in points where you're actually drawing that out of people. And I think the other drawing out of people is the "What help could you use or what help could you offer in the group?" The way I visualiz that is that first question is really about aligning up to he overall goal and functioning f the of the collective. And th n the second is about the rel tional space between the people who make that up. Are we offe ing and accepting help on a regu ar basis? Because that's the thi g about defined roles that I ru into a lot. When we have very efined roles, it limits our ab lity to help each other and to a k for help. I get edgy when p ople are like, "Well, we need o define whose job this is." Ul imately, that exists to achieve another piece in here about changing who is in a role. And, the larger purpose. And so fund mentally doesn't matter who d es it. And if we overly define t, then we land in that sp ce of if we're in that role and it's not happening, but we know it's our job to do it, i can be super hard to ask for he p. And if we see a thing that's not happening, and we know it's omebody else's job, it can be s per hard to offer help. And s that's where the the rigidity tarts to set in, where I where I see groups have p oblems. But the other end is j st the complete ambiguity, in te ms of everything's just free lowing, and we have no idea what s going on. And that's where th ngs can fall through the crac s, where there may be things hat are not getting done, or here may be things that are get ing done that don't contribu e to the purpose. Those are the two failure modes of that level of definition we have. A d so what I like about what you're pointing at is being ble to have those regular conver ations about how are we curren ly aligned to purpose? And how re we helping and offering hel and getting help from each oth r? Those are things, those are p actices that allow us to tun where on that spectrum of clari y to flexibility we curren ly are and where we need to be ight now. Because we might be in a moment where we need to e more flexible. We might be n a moment where we need to be clearer. We don't know. And if we're doing that, it allo s us to adapt to the current si uation. you know, I think in the sort of corporate world, we tend to do that when someone quits or gets fired, right? That's usually what happens. Or promoted. Sometimes they get promoted, and they're in a different role now.

Karen: 12:09

Fair, fair. And I think about the community world or volunteer based world where, yes, people sometimes quit, it's less likely that they'll get fired, maybe even less likely that they get promoted but that piece about sometimes, just for power dynamics reasons, it's good to shift. This is where hierarchy can really get in our way. "Well, it's a promotion." Well, what if it's not a promotion? What if it's just a good idea? What if it's just a change that should happen? And so being willing to think about, is there a staleness? Or is there just somebody else who'd like to do that task or take on that role? Is it time to shift things around, and particularly in volunteer organizations where power dynamics can get incredibly messy. And especially if you're trying to keep very equal power dynamics and not rely on a hierarchy, I'm going to suggest that, if you've held a role for more than a year or two, it's time to be asking the question, should we change? And on the flip side, I've seen groups that were like, "We're going to get a new facilitator for every meeting." And I'm like, "Oh, that's a really good way to never have a good facilitator." Like, we never get good at that job. And so I think there's some real discernment about where do we want to make regular changes and that's going to be especially in power holding roles and where do we want to keep the same person in a role, because learning that role over time for a period of time has a real benefit. And consistency has benefits. We who we go to for that thing. And then the last category I want to put in there, there are some things that aren't power dynamics roles. It just gets done. So you know, the same person always changes the lightbulbs, and none of us ever knows anything about that, and they just handle it and it's taken care of, and why would you mess with that? And so I think there's a whole range of kind of possibilities in that, but you want to balance it. Getting some new or different energy can be just in and of itself, really helpful. Because new ideas will come with it and new ways that can be very helpful. And change is stressful in an organization. Any change is stressful to an organization. So use that stress quotient wisely, as you're looking at changing either moving tasks around and the kinds of conversations we were talking about earlier or just switching who's in which roles

Paul: 14:57

The thing about roles is that they are how groups get things done. They're essential to the functioning of groups, because otherwise certain things don't happen. Roles exist to accomplish stuff. And so they are important that way. I think it is really important to spend some time figuring out who's gonna do what, and having a degree of clarity around that. And the other thing around it that I've learned over my years of working in groups, is that very often, what looks like an interpersonal conflict between two people is actually a lack of clarity either around a shared goal, or roles and responsibilities. That they actually don't realize that each of them thinks the other one is supposed to be doing a thing, or that one of them is supposed to have it and the other one's not supposed to, but they're both grabbing it. It's actually one of the places that I go very early when I'm called into work with a group that's in conflict. Because I'll hear, "Well, the problem is these two people." And I'm like, let's actually back up and see are there systems things that we can look at, that are way more mutable than individuals. If we can create clarity around goals, and that will resolve whatever conflict this is, that's way easier. If we can create clarity around roles and responsibilities and get agreement and alignment around that and that resolves the conflict, that's way easier than having to deal with the deep-seated personal things that are embedded deeply in each person. And so it's one of the reasons why I spend time in this space. I find it's a much bigger and easier lever to to create function in groups than sometimes it can appear. That's one of the reasons why I think a lot about it.

Karen: 16:57

Going back to the original question, who's going to do this? What we're saying is, you want to have a way to answer that. You want some roles, you want most of the things in your organization to have an answer that everybody knows, that's very transparen and very clear. And with that you need clarity about th overall goals of the team or the organization, and where eac role fits into that. And general knowledge of who's doin what and what those roles are And a really open culture abou talking about those things, s that you do get to have a spac to talk about who should, w o could who migh,t be doing wh ch tasks; which tasks maybe do't need to be done; which ta ks maybe could be added; and t at it's safe to have th se conversations, and that ther's a structure that stimula es those conversations, so t at they can happen both organica ly and there's a place where t ey do happen in a planned way. And then being thoughtful about folks changing roles, and when that might be useful keeping i mind both the value of changin roles (for a number of reason) and the stress it causes. And o that you're using your sort f stress quotient safely and wisely. And really just to wr p up how much this sort of wor can relate to conflict. A d where this is a place where if you can look here, you may ac ually be finding problems that look like interpersonal conflic, but you don't have to go deep into the psyches of the people who are struggling. You can s mply look at the structures and get clarity around these roles and tasks" kinds of ques ions and get some big benefits.

Paul: 18:39

Yeah. Well, that's gonna do it for us today. Until next time, I'm Paul Tevis.

Karen: 18:44

And I'm Karen Gimnig, nd this has been Employing ifferences.