By Michael Mellen

​When my daughter was 18 months old, she got hold of a spoonful of hot salsa and ate it. I watched as she scrunched up her face, turned a bit red, closed her eyes, paused for a moment, and then determinedly said, “More.” She’s been eating the most flavorful and spicy salsas and sauces she can find ever since.  She received a box of 40 different hot sauces for her 11th birthday. Each of us has a different tolerance or preference for spice, and the foods we choose or the foods we cook for others reflect those preferences. We seek that perfect space between flavorless and scalding.
 
Leaders hold the responsibility for helping their teams stay in that space between flavorless and scalding as well. Ronald Heifetz, Alexander Grashow, and Marty Linsky explain in Harvard Business Review, “Keeping an organization in a productive zone of disequilibrium is a delicate task; in the practice of leadership, you must keep your hand on the thermostat. If the heat is consistently too low, people won’t feel the need to ask uncomfortable questions or make difficult decisions. If it’s consistently too high, the organization risks a meltdown: People are likely to panic and hunker down.” This zone of disequilibrium creates space for creativity, productivity, and intentional evolution. It has the potential, in our constantly shifting environment, to engage team members throughout the organization – rather than solely the senior leadership – in problem solving and vision.  

This space can be uncomfortable, even disconcerting, but it’s also a space of energy, excitement, creativity, and growth. The constent balancing asks leaders to help manage the in-between. 
 
Challenge your team. Push them to solve wonky issues or take on new responsibilities. Help to identify prickly issues. Task them with answering key visionary questions. Provide a challenging deadline. 
 
And help your team to manage their discomfort, energy, and creativity. Turn down the heat when needed. Attend to their needs of head and heart. Have their back. Provide parameters or guidelines. Inject fun.  

Last night my daughter tried hot sauce on a brownie. While the combo wasn’t a success, she tried hot sauce on ice cream next. Clearly, that magical perfect space between flavorless and scalding remains elusive, and, still, leaders are called to help teams keep the heat up without burning.  ​

By Michael Mellen

When supervising, parenting, advising, mentoring, or coaching, when the other person seems to be on the right track, I often have one more thought, idea, or tweak to consider. Or two more. Or three. Even when I know the person I’m talking with has a good idea, I still sense that extra little something that might make all the difference and I share and share again. Sharing isn’t so harmful, maybe it’s even helpful in the moment. However, people start to count on me for an extra idea, for advice, for having an answer, and they start to trust themselves a little less. Without much effort, I’m doing their work, coming up with their ideas, trusting in me instead of in them. I’m getting in the way of them owning their work. 

Imagine that a staff person comes to you with a challenge. They share the challenge with you and you ask, “How are you thinking of handling this challenge?” Your team member shares an idea. If you’re like me, and this idea is decent, you will share all the ways in which their approach works and ways in which it might work even better. This approach seems to be successful.

However, there’s another option. Use “My Scale of Close Enough.” ​

​What is My Scale of Close Enough? It’s a scale from 1-10 that indicates how close to outstanding (a 10) an idea or plan needs to be for a leader to respond with, “Great. Go try it,” or “Go for it,” without adding anything or suggesting a change.  

In part, a leader’s spot on the scale is circumstantial, as there are times where the plan must go very well or the risk of failure is too great. However, the score is also highly related to a leader’s general approach or comfort level.  

What is your score? If you’re a 9 or 10, you’re looking for your team member’s plan to match your ideal plan pretty closely. If you’re a 6-8, you’d like the plan to be pretty good, but it can differ from your ideal a bit. 5 or under and you’re generally willing to let your team try whatever they’d like. Most of us have a general score, though it will inevitably vary depending on the circumstances. But it’s important to consider whether your score is a bit too high in most day-to-day situations and if you can take a step back and give the people you work with more autonomy and ownership of their work. 

How can I use my score in practice? Pay attention when a team member brings you a challenge to discuss or an idea for a new project. If their plan is good enough, if it meets your score, just say, “Go for it. Let me know how it goes,” and send them on their way. No additional tweaks or suggestions needed, just support to act on their idea. Down the road, you’ll check in with them to reflect on what worked, what didn’t, and what they might do differently in the future. In the moment, though, leave the work with them.  

What’s the potential impact? This approach supports creating an environment where people other than you own the work, come up with ideas, and can learn from their successes and their mistakes. It also creates an environment where you remove yourself from micromanaging other people’s jobs so you have time to focus on your own work. You uncover more time for reflection, growth, and improvement. Notably, this is not an absence of supervision or guidance but rather a reframing of how and when you share your ideas, values, and insights in a way that best supports your team and allows the work to happen in meaningful ways without you getting in the way. 

Need some guidance on how to get more comfortable with being close enough? Contact us today.