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Explaining Away a Lack of Success

It’s been a rough couple of years.  It looks like were not completely out of the woods yet either.  In the companies that we work with here at ROI, we see lots of people who are grateful to have jobs, but feel run down, exhausted and wondering if there is a light at the end of the tunnel.  Given this, it’s easy to let them off the hook by pointing to all the things that have prevented them from being successful or from meeting targets.  The article linked below from Manufactures Tech calls this “failing elegantly.”  It’s a great phrase.  It reminds me of Nixon’s “ withdrawal with dignity.”    It has been a couple of years that have kicked us hard.  But explaining away our inability to meet goals, even when some of it is true, just sets us up to miss again.  Allowing us to look around and point out all the reasons we didn’t make goals makes it easier to try a little less.  A more productive approach is to treat each poor period as  a “game tape” to be reviewed and see if we missed anything.  It takes a strong leader and a smooth facilitator to get people engaged in this kind of conversation, but it worth the effort to create a culture where0 workers go into each new situation eagle-eyed for hidden opportunties and not-yet-seen barriers.

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Filed under: Leadership

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