Escalations.
‘A word and everything is saved. A word and all is lost.’ — André Breton
Dealing with issues that belong to others is an unwelcome aberration, not a norm. You must learn and practice avoiding taking over others’ problems, even, or maybe especially, when invited to do so.
As a manager’s restraint in this area is often interpreted as a failure to ‘lead’ and be decisive, we accept escalations regularly, willingly, and without much reflection on the undesirable consequences.
Never ever get provoked, tempted, intimidated, or manipulated into taking decisions on matters that do not belong to you. Be especially careful with areas in which you somehow think you’re an expert. If someone succeeds in provoking you, you are complicit in the provocation.
People will learn your triggers and will not hesitate to pull them if it serves their purposes. They will become experts in exploiting your savior syndrome, and we all have at least a modicum of it. Even a seemingly benign question for ‘advice’ is a trap, and an answer is your foot in it.
When approached, you must be clear in your head, have ice in your veins, and be extremely precise in your words and consistent in your actions. The margin between saving and losing the situation is very narrow.
It’s not about what you think about escalations. It’s not about singing oracles on the importance of taking ownership. It’s not about the theory of it.
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It’s about what you specifically say — first, second, and last — when approached by two members of your team who cannot agree on a decision. About how you make the experience both mildly uncomfortable and utterly ineffectual for them.
Over time, you will get better at it, if your resolve is strong enough.
You will find the right words to expose the inappropriateness of an escalation attempt. You will learn to stay in your lane and steer the discussion toward defining the process and timeline by which the decision will be made by its owner. In the meantime, let them suffer the pain of no decision. Otherwise, you open the floodgates to more escalations. Cross-functional collaboration will die out.
The mainstream leadership theorists may disagree.
They often see escalations as self-serving opportunities to add value or remove roadblocks. To shine as leaders. They may be quick to offer a popular quote from Colin Powell:
‘The day the soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help them or concluded that you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.’
Well, maybe that’s how things work in the army, though I doubt it. But we are not trying to be a decorated-general-turned-leadership-guru here. We are not into the nebulous sphere of ‘leadership’. We are talking about being a skilled manager, confident in their craft, doing their thing.
They abhor escalations and know how to deal with the emotional fallout that their stance may bring.
