Tag Archives: advice
You are here: Home > advice

What To Do When Employees Make Excuses

Posted on April 7, 2011 by in Articles

Excuses are very easy to fix. They are motivated by a fear of being blamed, so all you have to do is remove the presumption of blame and excuses generally go away.

Years ago, I destroyed my car. Through a combination of abusive driving and ignoring certain warnings, I basically blew up the engine. The car died while I was on a highway, I had to get towed 100 miles, and it cost me thousands of dollars to fix.

When I walked in the door that night and explained everything to my wife, I had a list of world-class excuses ready to go. After all, I deserved blame; I was totally at fault for both killing my car and being a total moron. But my wife looked at me and said, “So when do you pick up your car?” I don’t want to infer that she was happy; she clearly understood I was a moron, but she analyzed the situation and saw that blame wasn’t going to get the car back any faster, nor was it going to teach me any more lessons than I had already taught myself. (It does help that I’m married to an A-List clinical psychologist with the patience of Job).

I didn’t need my excuses because I wasn’t being blamed (I wasn’t being excused, but I wasn’t being blamed). My wife did monitor my car maintenance for a while (she even got creative with Family Car Day, where we both take our cars in for servicing and then go out to a fun breakfast with the kids), and today my car could star in commercials for a 50-point Jiffy Lube check.

When you hear lots of excuses from your employees, it means they’re under the impression that you’re blaming them or about to blame them (you may not actually be doing any blaming, but that’s what they’ve internalized). The simple resolve is to say, “I’m not interested in fixing any blame, I’m only interested in fixing the problem.”

Does this mean you excuse the behavior? Of course not. You’re still going to track mistakes and failures, and too many may result in poor reviews, action plans and even dismissal. But the moment you hear an excuse, your concern has to be fixing the issue. If you’ve got a project on deadline that needs to get out the door ASAP, you can do your employee write-up 15 minutes later. It’s far more critical to act immediately to fix the problem and deliver the project.

In our new white paper, “Why Giving Advice Doesn’t Work,” you’ll learn the 5 key reasons advice doesn’t work and how to deliver tough feedback that’s met with acceptance and immediate action. Follow this link to learn more and download your FREE white paper now.

Advice Is Not Constructive Feedback

Posted on December 23, 2009 by in Articles

Who started the damaging rumor that tough feedback is easier to take when it’s delivered in a warm and fuzzy package? Sandwiching difficult feedback (“your work is unacceptable”) between niceties (“but you’re always on time and everyone here loves you”) is what I call the Compliment Sandwich. It may seem kinder, but it’s guaranteed that the only message being heard is the positive one. Equally counter productive is using words like “should”, “would”, “ought”, “gotta”, “must” and “try”, all which turn constructive feedback into advice.

It may “feel” nicer to make a correction by phrasing it as advice, “If it were me, I’d go with some brighter colors on that report.” However, there’s nothing in that statement that indicates a mandatory action. It’s just advice, and when an employee fails to take that advice (after all, it sounds optional), the penalty is often harsher to take than it would have been to just hear up front; “You must use brighter colors on that report.”

Which would you prefer: a) staying late to rewrite a report because the boss made the directions sound optional and then freaked out when you didn’t take his advice or b) leaving on time because you were told what the boss wanted from the get go?

Read our free white paper, “Stop the Compliment Sandwich,” to learn the most effective ways of giving feedback.

There are five core reasons advice doesn’t work as constructive feedback:

#1: Judgment- Giving advice sends a message that says, “You’re obviously not as smart as I am or you would have thought of this already.”

#2: Directive- As the boss, you have the right (and an obligation) to be directive. But when you deliver directions as advice, it comes off sounding like a recommendation, and that leads to unclear directions.

#3: Inflexibility- Advice offers two choices: take the advice or don’t take the advice. The former tends to incite resentment and the latter fear. A direct order is much easier for the ego to take.

#4: Narcissism- Admit it, we’ve all, at one time or another said, “If it were me, I’d do it this way,” not because it “has” to be done that way, but rather to fill a personal emotional need. There’s nothing constructive about that.

#5: Unsolicited- Unless someone has asked to be judged, corrected or directed (and not many of us do), being on the receiving end of advice typically raises the impenetrable walls of defensiveness. Which means nothing is being heard.

There’s one golden rule for delivering constructive feedback: If something is mandatory, where an employee will face repercussion if they don’t do it an exact way, don’t even think about softening directions and corrections. That means no Compliment Sandwiches and no advice; just the facts. In the end, upon being rewarded for a job well done, your employees will thank you.

Read our free white paper, “Stop the Compliment Sandwich,” to learn the most effective ways of giving feedback.