Your People Are Watching Your Every Move (and non-move)

My colleague Jim Hopes wrote recently about the importance of expectations, explaining our lever analogy . People learn and grow in response to the expectations set by others—parents, teachers, friends, colleagues, mentors, and in the workplace, most especially managers who know how to do their job.  Expectations are most effective when they’re individualized, tailored to the unique strengths of each person you manage and to where they are in their growth curve.

But there’s another kind of expectation we set, and while not at all individualized, this type of expectation is also very powerful. These are the expectations we set nearly every minute of every business day, simply by doing our jobs.

Most managers think of these activities in terms of their inherent value or purpose or impact. But think again—because each one has an expectation value as well. Your people are watching your every move (and non-move), drawing conclusions almost constantly about what’s important to you, where your priorities lie, and the expectation implication built into everything you say and do.

As leaders and managers, we set expectation by the…

Policies we prescribe

Accounts we assign

Technology we install

Resources we provide

Tasks we delegate

Questions we ask

Activities we inspect

Budgets we establish

Deadlines we set

Performance we measure

Recognition we give

Outcomes we reward

Achievements we celebrate

Criticism we deliver

Talent we recruit

People we promote

Folks we fire

Values we demonstrate

Energy we show

Behaviors we model

Time we invest

Attention we pay

Suggestions we make

Empowerment we grant

Information we disseminate

Arrangements we cancel

Crap we tolerate

Stuff we ignore

Handle with care. Make sure you’re setting the expectations you intend to set.