Trust is the key to the kind of vibrant, inclusive work cultures we want to be a part of. Trust of our leadership, trust of our teams, trust of our co-workers, trust of ourselves.

Asking powerful questions is one of our greatest tools as leaders. It can help us empower our supervisees, encourage participation on a team, build and strengthen relationships, find the pause before we react…

Can you guess the MOST FREQUENT area of stress that comes up in my People Leader trainings? Setting expectations for the employees you supervise.

Whenever I train People Leaders (supervisors), I ask the crowd: How many of you have been in the situation of being promoted into a supervisory role above your current peers/team members?Always more than two thirds of the room raise their hands.

We’ve all been there. The team meeting is chugging along. Moving from agenda item to agenda item. And then, something shifts. Maybe you can feel the tension, sense a weird energy, or notice resistance lurking below the surface.

Let’s face it. It can be anxiety-producing to wade into hard conversations. You might need to have a conversation about performance with a direct report. Or you need to bring up a touchy subject with your co-worker. We’ve all been there.

When I ask supervisors for their burning leadership questions and the hardest parts of being a supervisor, one theme that comes up is communication.

I often ask leaders in my trainings questions like: "What are your burning questions about being a people leader?" and "What is the hardest part of being a supervisor?" I thought I'd share some of what I'm hearing.

What does it look like to lead in a complexity? That's one of the big questions Margaret Wheatley's book, "Who Do We Choose to Be? Facing Reality, Claiming Leadership, Restoring Sanity," is helping me explore.

I have found the past few months especially stressful. There has also been a lot of uncertainty. Factors that are just plain out of my control.

Think of a leader who you really admire.I would be willing to bet you a cup of coffee that person was emotionally smart. 

One day as I was working in my role as chief financial officer of a national nonprofit, my deputy director blurted out, “Well… we know you don’t like to receive feedback.”   I was shocked. I thought I was just fine with feedback.   I gave her an uncomfortable laugh and asked, “Really? I come across that way?”

Are you managing a team where only a few dominate and others seem to be just watching the clock?  Or is your team just a collection of individuals who report to the same manager?

In emergent landscapes we can’t rely on usual ways of planning. Uncertainty, change, and unpredictability all abound. Making it hard, and ineffective, to focus on planning. But we do have other tools at our disposal.

Emergent landscapes are, to say the least, tricky.It can be hard to even see you are in one!It can be so uncomfortable to stay in the uncertainty and just pay attention.

I think it’s time to get real about where one-on-one conversations can go wrong. We’re going to explore two scenarios that are all too common. Ready to play along?

We’ve covered what can go right and wrong with a one-on-one conversation. And we’ve taken care of the nuts of bolts of what a one-on-one conversation is and why it’s important.
Now we’re going to talk about how to prepare for your conversation.

One-on-one conversations are a dedicated and focused time to hold a private meeting between a supervisor and supervisee.

One-on-one conversations between a supervisor and supervisee are an important part of building a strong, working relationship based in trust and communication. They are your best opportunity for guidance, support, providing/receiving feedback, collaborating, listening, problem solving and going deeper.

Turnover rates are high. In fact, in the nonprofit sector the voluntary turnover rate is nineteen percent. This is higher than the labor market as a whole, which has a turnover rate of twelve percent. This is alarming for a few reasons.