The Leadership Paradox - Giving Up to Succeed
Several years ago I decided to treat myself and my wife to a holiday on the wonderful island of Santorini. We chose a luxury boutique hotel with a price tag to match! The hotel was everything we expected and more, even down to the iced face cloths and free cocktails brought to us as we basked in the heat. It was mid-summer and the temperatures hit almost 40C during the day and not much cooler during the evenings...and therein lay the problem. The electricity supply to the hotel often failed which meant the rooms never really got cooled by the air-conditioning. In such oppressive heat this was a big problem and after just a few sleepless nights the luxury and splendour seemed a bit irrelevant. I decided to discuss with the problem with the manager.
Adopting the role of a disgruntled customer I described my disappointment and protested how crazy it was to not get the basics right. The manager was having none of it but it always too hot to continue the discussion for more than 5 minutes and so so the saga rolled on. I became more tired and irritable and the manager more entrenched and defensive of her wonderful hotel. After 4 days of on-off complaining I was just about ready to give up on getting anything done when I suddenly realised...neither of us was really listening to one-another! We were simply assuming roles, of customer and manager respectively, becoming more defiant and seeing each other as the problem. Like a bolt out of the blue I was overwhelmed by a pang of dishonesty. Where was my empathy? Where was my active listening? Our conversations were more like the 'dialogues of the deaf' as Steven Covey calls it. So for no other reason than guilt I tried listening...no I mean proper listening with paraphrasing and exploration without bias, disagreement or judgement.
After a few minutes of listening to the manager I asked if she felt listened to and understood. She said yes. I asked her of she was prepared to listen to me. She said yes. I asked her if she was really prepared to listen to me and playback what she thought I said and meant until I felt understood. SHE SAID YES! After a few minutes of good listening by her I had said my piece and was good to go. I didn’t need anything sorting with my room, I'd stayed in worse places and was slowly acclimatizing and so with an air of satisfaction I was ready to return to the pool and continue my sunbathing and my holiday. I thanked the manager then turned to leave when she asked me what else she could do. I was a bit surprised by this and was also taken by her change in demeanour. I asked for a discount on the final bill and and quick-as-a-flash she offered a very generous reduction. I was both amazed and shocked. I thought it couldn't get any better when she asked if it would be OK to have some champagne brought to our room. OK...I thought. At last we were relating as human beings, not manager or customer. We had connected!
When I had given up my rights as a customer to be listened to first I also gave up any idea of getting what I wanted and yet in giving up this right I got much more than I ever bargained for.
Whatever your challenges, circumstances, rights or wrongs...I wonder what you need to give up to succeed?
