Build a Relationship Between People & Their Craft - Part 1

Build a Relationships Between People & Their Craft - Part 1

Engaged Leadership

In the previous posts we introduced the formula for creating a Growth Culture.

Role Growth + Engaged Leadership = Growth Culture

We also identified the four stages of role growth for every position in your organization:

• Task Equipped
• Emotionally Invested
• Craft Mastery
• Power Confidence.

Over the next series of posts we will explore what engaged leadership looks like in a Growth Culture, and how to become that type of leader.

I am a bit of a word nerd, so let’s start with the definition of “engaged.” When someone is engaged, they are actively involved in what they are doing. They have made a commitment and are investing time and energy to create a positive outcome. Engaged leadership means that you are actively involved in the development of your team. It is the opposite of hiring people and expect them to figure things out on their own. Engaged leaders intentionally connect with their people to ensure that they are trained and confident in their role to support the growth of the organization. 

Engaged Leaders Build the Behaviors of Growth in Their Team

Engaged leaders implement actions that strengthen the team member’s ability to see, anticipate, and respond in ways that drive growth. Three actions are at the core of engaged leadership

• Building a relationship between people and their craft
• Creating a learning environment that fosters self-discovery
• Helping people channel their energy when they are in The Growth Zone

Over the next three chapters we will explore these three leadership actions. When you master and apply these actions consistently over time, your team will develop the behaviors of growth faster. Mastering and applying these leadership actions is the different between creating doers of tasks and creating drivers of growth. The focus in this chapter is the first leadership action - how to build a relationship between people and their craft.

The Do & Discuss Method

All relationships are built around two actions – doing things together and discussing things. We refer to this as the Do & Discuss Method. The Do & Discuss Method is the foundation for every relationship in life – work, family, and friends. For our discussion now, the focus in work relationships. The more that you do things together with your team and discuss what you did, the stronger the relationship develops will be between you and your team and between them and their craft. It all begins with investing in your team. Before people emotionally invest in their role, they need to know that you will invest in them. It is a basic principle of human development at work. People invest more in their work when you invest more in them.

What you do together and how you do those things will impact the relationship in liberating or limiting ways. In this chapter we have described the keys to building a dynamic relationship between people and their craft.

Here are five simple things you can do to build stronger relationships with your team:

• Block time to meet with each team member on a regular basis.
• Listen more than you talk. Develop a set of questions to use whenever you are interacting with team members, peers, your leader, and clients. When you feel the urge to talk, resist until you already had a strong relationship or until the person asks you a question. 
• Block time to observe your team members in their work setting.
• Never make assumptions that you know how someone is thinking or feeling.
• Identify critical times of the day/week/month to be present with your team.

Build the Right Relationship

Bookshelves, the internet, and workshops are full of resources about building relationships. The vast majority of these are about relationships between people. Very little is written about building a relationship between people and their craft. The relationship between people and their craft, though, will determine the level of performance they achieve. For example: To be a great musician, you must build a relationship with your instrument and the music you play. To be a great scientist, you must build a relationship with your field of study. To be a great athlete, you must build a relationship with your role, the sport you play, and how your role leads to team success.

Every day people communicate, solve problems, collaborate, make decisions, innovate, and more. They do this within the context of their role. So roles are more than a collection of tasks. Their role is about what they do, how they do it, when they do it, and who they do it with. This collection of actions, connections, and skills creates their craft. To grow in their role, people must develop a relationship with these different dimensions of their craft. The stronger the relationship with their craft the faster they will grow in their role. Your job is to help them build a dynamic, healthy, and growing relationship with their craft.