Inspect What You Expect
“Inspect What You Expect”
When I had my coworking space back in 2018 my business coach said this phrase to me and it has stuck with me and randomly comes up in my coaching sessions.
Inspect what you expect.
Recently I’ve found myself sharing this phrase with clients who are growing a team or who have a team and are working on moving themselves from the owner role rather than the operator role.
As owners, we are typically the visionary. We have a ton of ideas and we share those ideas with our team and then go on to the next thing.
What’s the problem with that?
While our team could be amazing - we can’t fully leave a vision in their hands and expect them to fully execute without determining some specifics:
What are the expectations as far as deadlines?
Are they working with a budget?
What can they run with and what needs approval from you?
If some things need to be done a certain way, is there a process to follow?
Are there checkpoints to make sure everyone and everything is on target?
Taking the time to go through these questions will create a solid foundation for the vision and a gameplan for the execution, then as the project is underway we as owners can check in to see where things are.
If we’re not taking the time to check in and are fully expecting them to take full ownership then you have to be really careful not to come in all heated when it’s not going like you thought it would - ohhhhhkay?
Something I developed while running my space (out of that coaching session) and what I’ve encouraged owners to do is having an actual agenda when doing employee check-in meetings… and if you’re not having them…have them. This will keep you on task and help you see the things that are going well, things that are going a little sideways, and things that need to be taken care of ASAP.
And if you have a manager you could assign them to bring certain information to the meeting (update on sales, any employee issues, where they are within a project you all are working on, etc).
Having a team is amazing and a big accomplishment, but let’s make sure we’re showing up as strong leaders by inspecting what we expect so we can all be on the same page!