Hey ,

In the spirit of Communication (Module 2), I think it's fitting to bring up a convo I had with a client recently in regards to employee feedback. It went a little something like this:

Client: ".... and I'm tired of these careless mistakes he's making. I have to let him know that he can't be making these mistakes. There's too many eyes on us right now...."

Me: "Do you think it was a genuine mistake or do you think there's something more to it?"

Client: "No, I know it was an honest mistake, he's still new but he's just not getting it quickly enough"

Now, we've all been in this situation. If you've ever been responsible for someone else's behavior/results, you have wondered "What the heck were they thinking?". And that's ok. In fact, it's completely normal.

What isn't normal is expecting people not to make mistakes. It's human nature. We're flawed. We're all multi-tasking and juggling a million things at once - even if certain people don't look or act like it. (I know you're thinking of someone - no judgement here though)

So what can we do? Set ourselves up with proper expectations by knowing that our people will make mistakes. That it's not if but when. And when they do, let them. And then (most importantly) help them through it.

What I like to do, even before approaching the mistake, is ask them what was their goal - the intended outcome. This is mainly to see if they understood the destination (which is usually where things can go awry). Many times, simply by starting here and talking it out, they realize where they went wrong all on their own. Then all you have left to do is iron out the correct process for them and get their confirmed understanding of this process for next time.

But what we don't want to do, is make people feel like they can't make mistakes. Or that there's extreme consequences when they do. That's the quickest way to stop your people from making decisions that move your team and the business forward on their own. And it just keeps a whole lot of mess on your plate that doesn't need to be there.

So, can you relate to this? If there's a time you can remember when you wish you would have responded differently to someone's mistake, bring it to our call on Thursday at 7pm EST. Let's have a fun and enlightening conversation on communication (or anything else that's coming up for you in your leadership journey).

Here's the Zoom link:

Topic: The LAB - Group Call

Time: Apr 3, 2025 07:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/84188796768

Meeting ID: 841 8879 6768

And as always, please let me know if you have any questions about anything or difficulties accessing anything in the course materials. I'm just an email away. Hope to see you on Thursday. :)

~RaeAnn