Trust must be nimble. You must be able to adapt quickly, read situations, react to changing circumstances, and more. You also have to be able to forget.
According to the fictional character Ted Lasso, “be a goldfish.” He concludes that goldfish are the happiest of all animals because they have a 10 second memory.
That could apply to leadership as well. You could benefit from a 10 second memory.
But not always. You can’t forget in the case of an employee who, despite being counseled numerous times on any issue, continues with the same behaviors. It’s all about the shelf.
I attended a wedding a few years ago where the bride was Christian and the groom was Jewish, and the marriage was presided over by both a Christian pastor and a Rabbi. The ceremony was quite enjoyable despite the incredible heat of the afternoon, but the Rabbi won the “contest” for best marital advice.
Clean the shelf.
He encouraged the couple, as well as everyone in attendance, to imagine a shelf in your marriage. This isn’t a physical shelf, but it helps to envision it as real. And every day, things get put on this hypothetical shelf.
Laughter, tears, joys and grievances. If your husband left the toilet seat up and it annoyed you, that goes on the shelf. If your wife left the milk on the counter before she left for work and now you don’t have milk with dinner, that goes on the shelf as well.
Our shelves can get really full during the course of a day. But as a couple, if you take inventory of the shelf every night before bed, you have a powerful opportunity.
Together you can review the wonders of the day, the feelings of joy, the moments of laughter and bliss. Take a moment to reflect on what was good about the day between you both, like complimenting one another or take time to rub someone’s aching shoulders.
Then the tougher work begins. Take a look at the grievances, the frustrations, the hurt feelings, and talk about them too. Discuss them. Talk openly about them. Don’t allow the small moments of a day to build up on the shelf and gather dust as well as more hurts.
“I know you probably didn’t know that you left the toilet seat up this morning, but I certainly did when I fell in.” That could be a chance to express frustration while also making something funny.
“When I came home tonight, I saw that you left the milk on the counter. I know you probably thought you put it back in the fridge. It’s obviously gone bad now. I’m disappointed that I can’t have a glass of milk with dinner.” This could be an opportunity to give news that is just news (the milk was left out), to show your awareness that it wasn’t on purpose (I know you probably thought you put it back), and to still allow for you to experience disappointment.
But imagine how many days we let the frustration of the toilet seat go, to build up on the shelf, to be surrounded by other hurst and frustrations, until we begin to believe that the person knowingly and willfully does it just to annoy us. How does that support trust?
Clean the shelf off. Be a goldfish.
You can obviously see the correlations to the workplace as well. The employee who arrives late to work a couple times a week. The employee that is always slow in delivering results. The co-worker who spends too much time gossiping in the break room. The manager in another department who is aggressive and creates strife.
How many times are the frustrating behaviors simply allowed to build up on the shelf?
Being a leader takes that much more energy. Time. Focus. Attention.
Should people be responsible for themselves? Absolutely. Do we, as leaders, have the opportunity to clean the shelf more frequently, to deal with issues sooner, with less emotional baggage, and then move on?
Definitely.
With Fred, I realized that my initial response to act, and act quickly (aka, run right out the door with a bowl of food) was not going to get me the outcome I was looking for. I had to be able to adapt and change my strategy, but also to clean my own mental shelf. I had to review what was working and what was not, be flexible and open to adaptation, and let the mistakes go. Certainly, I wasn’t “forgetting” them in truth. I was letting them go in order to free up emotional space for the next attempt. If I wallowed in my mistakes, I wouldn’t be open to what was possible.
And can that lesson be applied to leadership?
Unequivocally.