“You shall never assume!”

In my last workshop with my team, discussing how we wanted to be as a team, a question came from one of the associates: “What do we mean by team here?”

The question struck me for a quick moment. Not because I did not have an opinion on it. More so because I realized I had fallen to a common leadership trap, which is to assume that everybody on the team has the same understanding of what a word or a decision means.

This is a great reminder that clarity in communication is paramount to provide effective leadership in a team or organization.

In fact, without clarity, you cannot get commitment from your team. Because clarity allows to remove assumptions and ambiguity from a situation.

As a leader, if you do not create that clarity, you are encouraging people confusion, which will often result in less performance from the team.

You achieve clarity by clarifying upfront any commitment, decision with the whole team until you are 100% certain everybody is on board and shares the same understanding (which does not equate to everybody agrees with a decision for instance!). Then you reach clarity by cascading the communication up and down the same way in the entire organization.

So next time you make a decision in a team meeting, ask the audience the question: “What have we decided here?” or “Does everybody agree that the decision is this?”

Let me know how you made your next meeting more efficient by communicating with greater clarity.

For comments or questions, please visit my website or contact me at pascal@p-m-coaching.com