Beverly Flaxington is a practice management consultant. She answers questions from advisors facing human resource issues. To submit yours, email us here.
Advisor Perspectives welcomes guest contributions. The views presented here do not necessarily represent those of Advisor Perspectives.
Dear Bev,
I have been following your work for some time. I appreciate most of what you write and speak about, and I take much of it to heart.
I’m having a problem with two key employees (“John” and “Jane”). I sought feedback from other group members about their behavior. I was very professional and asked mostly about obstacles and concerns they might have with their performance. I was a bit shocked to hear that John and Jane talked to these other colleagues about how difficult it is working for me. John and Jane have been here the shortest amount of time, 28 months and 16 months respectively. My other employees have been here five years or more, and some as many as 15 years.
The employees who shared this with me were very hesitant. I don’t want to betray confidences, but is it odd some newer people would have such negative things to say?
A.H.
Dear A.H.,
It’s an interesting question – should “newer” people be entitled to have an opinion about the person in charge and share that with others? This is such an interesting profession.
They have been with you 1.5 years and then over two years. I wouldn’t really say they are “new”. I understand relative to the rest of your team they are shorter timers, but they have certainly been around long enough to have a legitimate point of view. We have several things to consider:
- It sounds as if you have some issues with John and Jane directly that are germane to you. It would have been more productive to talk to them instead of seeking counsel and/or validation from other team members. This can cause a “he said/she said” experience and isn’t very productive. Instead, seek to understand from John and Jane. Be curious, inquire about what you think you observe and connect with them directly.
- I’m not sure how the other team members approached John and Jane. It sounds like they asked them about obstacles and challenges and John and Jane mentioned some things pertaining to you. Consider this feedback. It is possible John and Jane are seeing and experiencing things that you might want to think about and determine if they fit and if you need to make modifications. We are often so ready to fix others behavior but sometimes it really is ME that’s the problem and there are things I need to address.
- Consider your emotional quotient (EQ) in this situation. You term these newer employees, have talked to others about their behavior, have sent others out to see input and now are concerned you have heard negative feedback about yourself. This tells me you might have one or two areas to self-examine and manage differently. I’m not judging you, but asking you to think about this and question for yourself.
- Create a culture where people are free to express concerns, obstacles – and joys and excitement too. Don’t have it be a behind-the-scenes dialogue where people are not encouraged to address things directly. You need to model this behavior for your team and even if, in doing this, you hear things you don’t want to hear, be ready to address them professionally and openly. A culture where it isn’t safe to speak up is typically not a welcoming and collaborative culture.
Dear Bev,
I have a team of fearful people who don’t want to speak up when they should. How do you encourage people who fear what might happen to them to share their insights and observations?
I.A.
Dear I.A.,
There are a few reasons why people will not be comfortable to share concerns or challenges in my experience:
- The culture is one of “nice,” whereby people are vilified or ostracized for saying something negative. There is usually an unspoken agreement that everyone will smile and be kind, so no one wants to be the negative person who says something that isn’t positive and uplifting.
- There has been a punitive approach in the past when someone has spoken up and said something about obstacles or challenges. I’m always amazed at how one incident can follow a firm for years and years, even after the person who implemented the punitive approach is long gone! When this happens, it takes a lot of proof points to show the culture is no longer this way.
- You might be inadvertently shutting down responses. I once had a client – who I enjoyed working with – who would say, “I don’t want them to bring me problems, only solutions!” He was, without meaning to, creating a situation where people felt disempowered to speak their minds. If they didn’t know how to solve it, they couldn’t share it and yet sometimes the job of the leader is to help their team think through their problems and help them to overcome them.
- Your behavioral and communication style might be one where your words say, “Please tell me,” but your actions and attitude say, “I don’t want to know.” Self-examine to see if you are sending mixed messages.
- Create a culture where you share something you have observed about yourself or about your senior leadership team that needs to be addressed and dealt with, and then how you plan to do this. The more you raise obstacles and show how you will fix them, the more you model the behavior you want to see from others. It often starts with the leader!
Beverly Flaxington co-founded The Collaborative, a consulting firm devoted to business building for the financial services industry, in 1995. The firm also founded and manages the Advisors Sales Academy. She is currently an adjunct professor at Suffolk University teaching undergraduate and graduate students Entrepreneurship and Leading Teams. Beverly is a Certified Professional Behavioral Analyst (CPBA) and Certified Professional Values Analyst (CPVA).
She has spent over 25 years in the investment industry and has been featured in Selling Power Magazine and quoted in hundreds of media outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, MSNBC.com, Investment News and Solutions Magazine for the FPA. She speaks frequently at investment industry conferences and is a speaker for the CFA Institute.
Read more articles by Beverly Flaxington
Beverly Flaxington is a practice management consultant. She answers questions from advisors facing human resource issues. To submit yours, email us here. 
