GenXmanager: Leadership for the Generation X Manager

Last night’s episode of The Office was a bit depressing with Michael having money troubles, Dwight in despair over his break-up with Angela and a general sense of “doom and gloom”. However, there was a business lesson to be learned. In the midst of Michael’s money troubles he enlists Oscar’s help in analyzing his debt. Oscar suggests to Michael that he should speak with his girlfriend, Jan, about their poor fiscal health. Michael doesn’t want to reveal the truth. He wants to hide from Jan. He’s afraid to tell her. Eventually, he decides to run from his troubles; by hopping on a train that isn’t moving.

At work, we are faced with decisions each day. Some decisions are made easily and others take a bit of thought. Sometimes, a decision we make is the wrong decision and an error is made, money is lost, a client is upset, or a document goes missing. In my opinion, it is always best to admit a mistake or failure early in the process. I’ve seen too many people hide a fact from their boss hoping it will go away and all it does is get worse. Eventually, the person’s boss finds out about the mistake and the boss’ first question usually is, “Why didn’t you tell me about this earlier?”

This does not mean that you should run to your supervisor for every issue or that you should not try to rectify the situation on your own. You must be proactive and find solutions to problems (that’s why you’re getting paid for what you do!). If the error is “fixable” then fix it and inform your boss of the error, why it occurred, how it was remedied and what you are doing to ensure it does not happen again. If there error is significant in nature, it might be best to inform your boss first, gain insight, and partner for a solution. Being open and honest is always a good policy. Hiding information, especially negative information, just festers and eventually winds up getting worse and making everyone upset.

For leaders out there, it is critical that you welcome openness and honesty. Team members will make mistakes and it is far better for employees to inform you of their mistakes earlier in the game than later. Let them know that mistakes happen and when they do you expect to be notified, you want them to document the issue, how they will fix the situation, what they learned from the experience and what they plan to do so the mistake doesn’t happen again. Be a coach. Be a mentor. Teach your team to be a high performing, learning team.

Similar to situations in your organizations where a mistake was made and “doom and gloom” permeates the air, The Office ended on a note of hope. Dwight is back to his old self thanks to good deeds from Pam and Jim. Angela has accepted a date with Andy and Jan opened up to Michael and took their relationship to a new level. Despite the mishaps, there is always that silver lining. There’s always hope in the midst of hopeless situations.