5 Ways to Be a Terrible Boss: # 3: The Blind

This 5 part series is about ways in which you can be seen as a terrible boss. I do NOT want you to be seen that way. This blog post along with the last 2 and the next 2 blog posts are going to be about behaviors which are viewed as being terrible to your followers. It’s not too late to change…we all act like this from time to time.

     When you are the leader, one of the great opportunities you have is to set the vision and pace of the unit. You establish priorities on projects, the timing of work, and the assignment of tasks. In most instances, the leader has the ability to control or influence most of these basic leader responsibilities.

One of the toughest things for followers and organizations is if the leader does not have a vision. Sometimes as a new leader, it takes some time to figure out the direction, the strength and weaknesses of an organization, and to put forth a solid plan for a way ahead. During that interim, it is still important for the leader to know the direction of the organization. Nothing releases a leader from doing this basic responsibility of leadership.

So as the leader, your responsibility is to provide the strategic direction. From long-term strategic vision to meet the vision of the organization to the more short-term strategic vision to meet the immediate goals and objectives, the leader needs to make this direction very clear. You, the leader, need to ensure the plan is comprehensive, understandable, and actionable for the followers of the unit.

The level of your responsibility will drive the overall complexity of this direction. It makes sense the strategic direction and requirements of a medical surgical nursing unit will be vastly different than the strategic direction a Chief Nursing Officer. With each level of responsibility, more complexity and collaboration with other disciplines and units will occur. The beauty of leadership is that in an many institutions, you should grow from smaller to more complex leadership positions.

The behaviors of a leader with little, none, or not a well thought out or communicated vision is they will have no strategic plan presented, no clear direction for activities, and poor communication on the vision. These behaviors lead to a lot of outcomes which include wasted time by followers, underutilized resources of the organization, expended energy on worthless projects, confusion on behalf of followers who wonder why they are doing what they do, and increased frustration due to the previous mentioned outcomes.

As a reminder for you, all leaders can exhibit these 5 behaviors seen as terrible bosses presented in this series at one time or another. As I have shared in the previous 2 posts, I have done all these things at one time. This series is to help you work through all 5 behaviors and improve your leadership.

Ok so what can you do? Look at these 3 simples steps to help you lead your unit with direction and more importantly, with purpose:

1. Understand the mission. You are solely responsible to communicate the vision for the unit. You need to ensure you understand the mission. As simple as that sounds, it might not actually be that simple for some. In a lot of organizations, the mission of a unit or the entire organization can be confusing. In this day of doing more with less, everyone has taken on so many responsibilities and roles to help the organization. Your role is to break down the jobs presented and help your staff understand what they “SHOULD” be working on. This may also lead to a lot of discussion on what the mission is for your unit or organization. Getting to the heart of the mission of the organization is needed if you are going to set a direction for your followers.
2. Develop priorities. Once you understand the mission, then setting priorities is paramount. The development of priorities helps your followers to know which of the tasks will have higher need for accomplishment. A benefit of setting and discussing the priorities with your followers is they are able to exercise their leadership and autonomy in their work environment. They want to know which direction they are going and the priority of the work. They don’t want you to micromanage their daily work (See 5 Ways to Be a Terrible Boss: # 3: The Micromanager for more info). By providing the priority to the tasks they are to accomplish, the followers can then work their tasks and provide sold job satisfaction in meeting the mission along with personal satisfaction in a job well done.

   A word of caution on both this step and on step one: the mission and priorities of the organization can be a moving target depending on the environment in which you work and the leaders above you. Be prepared to change. Stagnation or sole dependence on a written document that was current once but does not now adequately represent the current work environment means certain disaster for your organization. Ensure you keep the vision current.

3. Provide clear and succinct instructions. And let’s add on to this, it should be understandable to your followers. If you as the leader have difficulty in communicating the vision and priorities, then your followers are going to be just as confused. A major challenge is leaders can have difficulty in providing clear understanding or instruction of what needs to be accomplished. This is a time when a leader can call on a mentor, fellow leader, or a follower to see if the instructions given are clear and understandable. If not, you have a chance to fix the message. Sometimes allowing followers to have input on how the topic is presented can provide the opportunity to clarify and verify the information is correct.

Leaders need to know and understand the mission of the organization, they need to be able to set the priorities and then clearly communicate these priorities and mission. This basic responsibility of the leader serves followers well in accomplishing the mission. It also allows follower the understanding to know where they can put their efforts in meeting the mission in all tasks. If as the leader you are blind to understanding the mission and helping your followers to know that mission, then let’s focus on seeing the mission. Set your priorities and with clarity, set a vision for your team!

Leading with you!

Dean

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