Sometime during 1990, while I was working with Honda, while taking one of our morning walkthroughs in the plant, my Plant Head, Mr. R S Bidesi, told me:
“Sandip, there are 550* eyes watching you all the time, whatever you do or chose not to do – is getting noticed and registered in their minds. So as HR people, you need to be extra careful”.
*There were 275 employees on the shop floor.
This was one valuable tip, that has stayed with me for ever. Now take that advice in its literal sense, what happens when an actor is performing either on stage or on screen – they too are watched very carefully by the audience. Their smallest move gets noticed and tiniest of the mistake can’t remain unnoticed.
If you are a leader, you are a performer. You may or may not be conscious about it, but you are performing and people are taking notice of it. Your followers (leaders will have followers too !!!) will always follow your actions and every word you say. This means that you need to be a performer and an actor to carry your followers with you consistently. But the key is, that you need to do it in a way that is authentic and trustworthy.
Like good actors, good leaders become the character in that moment and their success depends solely on how truly they carry out that character. If they lack in carrying that character, they will appear to be fake and people may not have trust on them.
During the 360 feedback, we usually explain to the concerned employee that no one is asking you to change your “Personality”, we are only asking you to tweak your said behaviour to ensure people in your eco-system take cognizance of that and this would help the person create the right perception.
In a way, what is being conveyed is “not to change” yourself (for the simple reason – as that is extremely tough) but create a perception that you have changed. So, Enact!!
Let’s understand this aspect by relating it to some of the key milestones of an employee’s life cycle.
- During Interview You sit to take an interview and you greet the candidate and your performance starts – you are carefully going through the CV and then you ask the questions. The candidate is saying something which is not to your taste or what you expected – but you continue to show interest.Towards the end, you do not reveal your decision and enact as if you are on top of everything and will come back to the candidate soon. Majority of the time, you have already made up your mind not to go ahead.
- New Employee When a new employee is introduced to his team – there will be some who will be nice to him/her and say the customary welcome jingle. But there would be someone for sure, who would be (appearing to be) extremely warm, cordial and would also add after the welcome note – “please get in touch with me for anything & everything, I am just a phone call away”. Now does that person really mean it – 100% “no”, but the excellent acting skills have done their trick and the new joinee is already on cloud nine, as he has not only met a “true friend”, but also has started creating the perception about “friendly” culture in the company.
- During Performance review Your dialogues are already prepared and you have rehearsed it also, albeit silently. You have also thought over your dialogues in case the review interaction is bound to get messy. You chose your words very carefully, when you are talking of your expectations from the subordinate. In your mind, you are clear that the message should have certain words to ensure employee feels charged and motivated.
- Handling a difficult employee Well, all your acting skills come for a test whenever you are handling a difficult employee – as you supposed to show your listening skills, compassion, empathy and at time little bit of anger as well to show him/her of the consequence, if he/she doesn’t amend – all at the same time.
- Handling a challenging situation Can you afford to show your stress, your helplessness or inability to handle the situation to your subordinates? As a leader, you have to pretend to the masses that you are calm, cool and composed irrespective of the turmoil inside you. You have to show that all situations leave some learnings and they pass, albeit the time is testing. In short you have to live “Tough Times Never Last, Tough People Do”. Nothing is possible, if you are not able to enact well. It’s a different story that you will show your anxiety to your core team members and be with them but showing your capability to lead in any situation.
- Letting go someone Oh. Boy, this is one conversation, that tests all your acting skills. Starting by making a poker’s face and saying, “I have some bad news for you” to controlling the emotions of the victim, it calls for extraordinary skills. That’s the precise reason, why all Managers can’t handle this situation well and they will always drag their feet.
A good leader can’t afford to run away and ask someone else to do their work. On the acting part, the leader needs to be quiet, wait for any questions and only then answer, offer to be helpful – depends upon how good/talented the person was. After the conversation, experts recommend saying, “Let me walk you back to your desk, where you can pick up your belongings, and then we’ll both walk out of the office together like it’s a normal day.” Acting skills to the hilt…Great leaders need to be great actors without showing their vulnerability. Either at a townhall meeting or while presenting an award or in front of an audience or while speaking to a journalist, every moment demands a high-quality acting skill. With practice, great leaders can turn any occasion to a moment that their subordinates can share with others. They need to take the time to make even smallest of the events noteworthy and those events will make the organisation’s culture, the way no Vision or Mission statement on the wall can make.