The elephant in the room
As the Global Head of Learning & Development in an MNC in my earlier avatar, my teams used to bring me requests for workshops on Team Building. Before approving the same, the process involved a discussion on the rationale for such a need.
Of the many questions that I would ask them, 2 questions were critical:
- What would be the impact of this workshop on the ground for the team?
- What would happen if the workshop were not conducted?
While most workshops would pass this 2-question test, occasionally, the team would be tongue-tied. They were not sure.
On most such occasions, it would be because the presence of the ‘elephant in the room’ was not being acknowledged.
The ‘elephant’ was the ineffective Manager of the team. Instead of working with the Manager to improve his effectiveness, the suggestion was to conduct a Teambuilding workshop and hope and pray that the intervention would somehow compensate for the ineffectiveness of the Manager. Fanciful imagination!
Lack of commitment
In my coaching assignments too, sometimes the ‘elephant in the room’ is not acknowledged or acknowledged rather reluctantly.
I was coaching a very senior person. When after a certain number of sessions, I pointed out to him the rather tardy progress on his various assignments, he was quick to blame his busy schedule. As he was not making much progress on his assignments, there was hardly anything to show in the coaching journey.
However, I could see the ‘elephant in the room’. It was a lack of commitment.
The role of a Coach
The role of Coaching is to forward the action and deepen the learning. It includes establishing commitment or accountability.
It was time to take the bull by the horns…or in this case, the elephant by the tusks.
I insisted that he use our meeting time – we were already in the meeting room – to complete his principal assignments. I had no problem waiting in the room until he completed the assignments. Being a very senior person, I don’t think he expected this suggestion. But within an hour or so, he had the assignments completed and we could have a great follow-up conversation. There was a perceptible shift in his approach in the subsequent sessions. He also acknowledged later that what transpired on that day with me had made him revisit his approach to his team when his team complained about the non-availability of time.
My Quote #37 says: ‘It is never about a lack of time, it is always about a lack of commitment.’
Not taking complete responsibility – the elephant in the room
In another case, I had been retained as a Coach to work with this senior person in an NGO to bolster his performance. I realized that in every session, he ended up blaming his team – they were not doing enough. In most situations, he was learning of the ‘bad news’ pretty late.
As the sessions progressed, I could see the ‘elephant in the room’. There was hardly any effective and proactive review mechanism. All the time, he was operating post-mortem. I had to introduce the ‘elephant in the room’ to him. It was not easy for him to take full responsibility for the consequences of his team’s actions and inactions. Till now, he had been using the team’s poor performance as a shield. But that was not possible any longer with me. I worked with him to develop a review mechanism including templates for his team to fill up ahead of a review with him. Later, as he happily confessed, instead of operating ‘after the fact’, he was now spotting early warning signals and taking proactive actions to manage the situation. His Manager was acknowledging the positive change.
Dealing with the elephant in the room
Acknowledging the elephant in the room could expose our vulnerabilities and dealing with the elephant could demand courage and action until the elephant disappears from the room.
Ideally, there should be no elephant in the room. Even if it is a different elephant during the different phases of our life or career, it can still be termed progress. But if it is the same elephant in the room for a long period, that surely spells disaster.
What about you? After reading this post, have you spotted your ‘elephant in the room’?
Well, let me know and we could work together to make the elephant disappear.
Interested in reading more from my Coaching Archives? You could begin here.
