When Ed Koch was mayor of New York, he was concerned about the number of accidents resulting from bikers darting in and out of traffic. Determined to solve the problem, he had “bike lanes” painted on the sides of city streets. But instead of making things better, the bike lanes actually made things worse. Drivers, undeterred by the double yellow lines identifying bike lanes, crossed them so frequently that police could not write enough tickets, and accidents involving bikers increased. As a result, Mayor Koch had the bike lanes removed, ending a futile exercise that cost the city millions of dollars.

Plenty of editorial space was given to criticizing the blunder and Koch’s poor judgment. Reporters, looking for blood, sought interviews with the beleaguered mayor. In one television interview he agreed to, which was scheduled to last thirty minutes, the host was armed with a list of questions that were sure to make Koch look bad. The host began by asking, “Mayor Koch, you spent millions of taxpayer dollars to paint those bike lanes only to remove them. That tax money could have gone to valuable social services. What do you have to say for yourself?”

Pausing, Mayor Koch replied, “You’re absolutely right. It was a huge mistake. I made the wrong decision, and I apologize.” The host, stunned by the mayor’s response, gathered herself and proceeded through her list of questions, each of which was an accusation of some kind. To each accusation, Mayor Koch gave a similar response, admitting the mistake and apologizing for it. The interview lasted for only five of the scheduled thirty minutes after which the topic was dropped, never to be raised again.

Mayor Koch’s success in this interview demonstrates the power of what we call Closure Conversations. By acknowledging the facts that New Yorkers already knew—that the bike lanes were an idea that didn’t work—and then apologizing for it, Mayor Koch completely disarmed the issue and brought it to a close. In the process, he restored some of his credibility and the confidence New Yorkers had lost in his stewardship of the city.

Closure Conversations can restore credibility and confidence, reduce resentment, build accomplishment and accountability, add velocity to projects, and increase the engagement of participants and potential participants.  Try them – they work.

[From “The Four Conversations: Daily Communication that Gets Results” by Jeffrey and Laurie Ford, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, p. 131-2]

During our discussion, several people pointed out how often they are not told why something is being undertaken and how much it bothers them.  Laurie and I heard similar comments from the managers and supervisors at Rolls Royce in Ohio who were going through several organizational changes.  When we told them about the four different types of conversations, they pointed out that they were not told why the particular changes were being made.

What was particularly interesting with both the COSI and Rolls Royce groups was that they were not so much concerned with the WHY itself as the fact that they were not being told.  In other words, it wasn’t important to them what the reason for the changes were, or why it they were important as much as it was that they were not being told; they were given no explanations.  For the people at Rolls Royce, the fact that they were not being told was seen as disrespectful and distrusting.

People want a reason for why you want something, and if you don’t give one, they can become resentful and hold it against you.  Some people may argue with the reason, dislike the reason, or even think its stupid, but they want a reason.  There is a story about people waiting in line to use a copier when someone tries to cut into the line without giving a reason.  People already inline got upset and “threw” the person out of line.  However, when another person tried the same thing, and gave the reason that they were in a hurry to meet a deadline, they were allowed to cut.  Telling people why you want something or explaining why you are doing something helps people to make sense of what is happening.

If you want more effective working relationships with people, try telling them WHY something is important.

In the absence of a deadline or due date, all you have is a ‘whenever’.  A ‘whenever’ is something that gets done… whenever they bug you enough for it, whenever you find time to work on it, whenever you feel guilty enough to do it, etc.  ‘Whenever’ is stressful, an ever-looming, unknown burden to be carried around.  ‘Whenever’s’, particularly from bosses, are fear generators – we worry about when it will come due, anxious it will be asked for before we have completed it, concerned about its impact on all the other work we have, and afraid of what will happen if we don’t get it done when they want it (even though we don’t know when that is).

Contrary to a ‘whenever’, a deadline is a tool for accountability and accomplishment.  Deadlines provide information that allows both the person giving it and the person receiving it to know how to plan and do their work.  Deadlines make both the person giving the assignment and the person getting it accountable for getting work done by a particular time, rather than whenever either feels like it should be done.  When we say this is “high priority”, we avoid our responsibility for doing the work necessary to determine by when it really needs to be done.

In some organizations, a “high priority” assignment means it is to be completed within a well known period of time, for example, 24 hours.  In those cases, giving someone a “high priority” assignment is tantamount to saying “Do X within 24 hours”.  But in organizations where “high priority” is not well defined, where managers use it indiscriminately, saying an assignment is “high priority” conveys no useful information for when it should be done, only dread and worry.

In the training session, managers from the one organization pointed out that managers are now saying things like “This is priority 1-A” in an attempt to distinguish their high priority assignment from all the other high priority assignments.  Who are they kidding?  All they are doing is adding confusion while undermining their own credibility and any chance of real accountability.

Do yourself and others a favor, make clean requests and give a due date.

The idea behind offering incentives is that they make a task or activity more attractive than it might otherwise be and thus increase the likelihood that people will do it.  But, as Dan Pink indicates and the research supports, extrinsic offerings don’t always work and in fact may actually make the activity less attractive.  But does this mean that incentives don’t work?  No, it means that what you offer someone as an incentive may not be an incentive.  Whether or not something is an incentive depends on its effect on the person to whom it is offered.  Incentives are meant to incent – to arouse or encourage.  If they don’t do this, then they aren’t incentives even if you call them incentives.

Whether or not something is an incentive, therefore, depends on the person to whom it is offered.  To offer workers who want more money more time off is unlikely to occur as an incentive to them.  In fact, you are likely to hear someting like “What kind of incentive is that?”, or “That’s no incentive?”  Since whether something is an incentive and works as incentive depends on the person to whom it is offered, using incentives is a tricky business.  In fact, many managers have found attempting to use incentives frustrating because they can’t seem to find “what works” and what they can provide isn’t always sufficient.  This is one reason why books on recognition, such as Make Their Day! Employee Recognition that Works, have become popular because they focus on things managers can do other than offer incentives.

One way around this issue is to ask people who are hesitant to do soemthing you want done “What would it take for you to do this?” and then determine whether or not you are willing to “pay the price”.  Another way around this issue is to build the level of integrity in the relationship so that people are accountable for what they say and know that they will be held accountable for what they say.  Surprising as it may seem, most people truly value their word and do not want to gain a repuation for being someone who “says yes, but does no”.  Giving people the opportunity to operate consistent with their word, and then operating consistent with their word, reduces the “guessing game” of incentives.  Then, when you do want to use incentives, you can ask people and they will tell you what will work.

Although there were a variety of answers, there were two underlying themes.  The first was how to motivate people to change.  The second was how to deal with people when they resist change.  It was all I could do to say “If you stop trying to motivate them, you might find they are more cooperative.”

Stop trying to motivate people!? Are you nuts Ford?  Isn’t motivation what leaders and managers are supposed to do?  How do you expect to get people to do what needs to be done if you don’t motivate them?

The answer to that question has two parts.  The first is by making good requests and getting good promises in return.  The second is by consistently following up on those requests and promises in order to build credibility, trust, and accountability.

In many cases, “motivation” has become the code word for convincing, either positively or negatively, people to do something we want done.  Such convincing may involve trying to inspire them, making them feel guilty or obligated, offering them some inducement, or threatening them.  But regardless of its form, convincing people (motivating them) has the effect of reducing people to victims.

How does it make them victims?  Because it says we are the cause of their behavior, not them.  They are doing what they are doing at the effect of “our” motivation.  It is tough to have others be accountable when we say we are the one motivating them – so they aren’t accountable for their behavior, we are.

Why not stop trying to motivate people and let them be accountable for their own motivation?  Make good requests in which you ask people to take actions or produce results by a specified due date, ensure they have the resources needed to do what is asked (this includes time and availability), and that they have an idea of how to accomplish what is being asked.  Let them know you are taking them at their word, ask if there is anything they need from you, and set a time to meet to discuss the outcome.  Then follow through true to your word.

Something happens when people realize their internal state (motivation) is not your responsibility, but is up to them.  They become more willing to engage with you as partners rather than someone you have to convince.

Folklore has it that if you want to kill a werewolf, you do it with a silver bullet.  In fact, the story is that a mere threat of being shot with a silver bullet will stop one in its tracks.  Ordinary people are also stopped in their tracks, sometimes with a single word or phrase, or tone of voice. These silver bullets stop productivity in its tracks.

A silver bullet is unique to each of us: it’s whatever way we don’t want people to think, say, or feel about us.  If we’re afraid people will think we’re arrogant or inconsiderate, then any hint that we are being arrogant or inconsiderate can stop us cold. If we’re proud of our honesty and integrity, or our intelligence and open-mindedness, or our principles and values, then we can be brought down by someone suggesting we’re dishonest, stupid, biased, or unprincipled.

Silver bullets are very effective – they always alter our behavior.  I know a manager who won’t ask his boss for anything – he doesn’t want to appear “incompetent”. Another friend doesn’t want to be thought of as “pushy”, so she avoids delegating assignments and does it all herself. An executive says he won’t apologize because he doesn’t want people to think he is “weak”. When we’re hit, or even threatened, by a silver bullet, we stop what we were doing and focus on how to deal with the insult.

The solution?  Get to know your silver bullets. What’s the worst, most offensive thing someone could think, say, or feel about you? What is the most important aspect of your reputation? What is the worst way to be perceived in the workplace? The answers to these questions will reveal potential silver bullets that give others control, steer you toward making reactive decisions, and jeopardize your performance.

Then consider disarming the bullets by “making friends” with them.  One way to do this is by public acknowledging the silver bullet through a closure conversation.  For example, one of my silver bullets is being called or thought of as “stupid” (and I have a Ph.D. to prove I’m not!).  Whenever I have a concern that people might feel or think that, I say something like “I know I might appear stupid at times, and its true that there are many things I am stupid about, but this is not one of them.”  I have even introduced myself to MBA classes making a statement like this just so that it will not be an issue for me.

Silver bullets are never about others, they are about our fears.  Maybe those accusations don’t deserve the power we’ve given to them.

[Adapted from Deadline Busting: How to be a Star Performer in Your Organization by Jeffrey and Laurie Ford]

Flying back from a seminar in California, I read an article by Clive Thompson in Wired Magazine (Issue 17.08) entitled “Forgetful by Design”.  In it, he discusses how we forget most things and that forgetting is really useful.  However, the internet, particularly You-Tube, Facebook, and other sites where all manner of personal information is posted make it more difficult to forget.  Why?  Because we can Google people and find all kinds of things that might otherwise have been forgotten.  The internet, unlike our memory, doesn’t forget.  Even though it might be hard to find, if its posted, its out there.  So, he proposes that we now have to remember not to remember.

What has all this to do with management, leadership, or anything else for that matter?  First, it reminds us that in the absence of some mechanism to keep us from forgetting, we (and others) probably will.  Posting something on the internet keeps it in existence.  It doesn’t disappear.  We might forget that it is out there, but a good search will find it, allowing prospective employers, spouses, and others to recall what we did.

Second, it reminds us that if you want to remember something, or want others to remember something, you have to find a way to keep it in existence.  One of the reasons people keep “To Do” lists is so that they will remember what they have to do.  The same with schedules, they help us remember meetings, appointments, and when we will work on things.  Relying on memory is not sufficient in today’s world.

If you find that people are often late with things, start sending them polite and respectful reminders to see if there is anything they need from you or that you can do to support them.  If people don’t write things down they say they will do for you, send them an email thanking them and briefly outline what it was they agreed to do.  The point here is to give them some support in remembering, since the odds are they will forget.