I recently sat with a CEO to report on his company. He listened, took notes, and asked salient questions. I was impressed.

My admiration was due in part to an observation I made to him about his executive team. They don’t listen well. They argue well.

And I admire their argumentation. It’s always been fair, willing to consider counterpoints, and has ended in concessions, compromises or decisions. 

What they don’t do is draw out more from the rest of the leaders, demonstrate genuine interest in another’s position, or ask more and better questions for greater understanding.

You’ve experienced this: fight to get what you want, and occasionally be a good sport should another win.

That’s not healthy collaboration. It certainly isn’t mature communication.

I wondered at the disconnect between the CEO’s communication maturity and the leadership’s lack thereof. Two observations came to mind:

You Don’t Always See What Is Lost When You Win

Bad manager behavior continues to be a top reason people leave companies. Feeling unheard remains a top experience of employees.

I have witnessed two bad habits. The first is stepping on people’s comments so that they do not finish their thought, even if you finish their thought with what they were going to say. The second is acknowledging what they said but dismissing it while holding to your own opinion.

(You already know that these don’t work well in personal relationships either).

You lose. You lose your team’s belief in collaboration; you lose their input feeling valued. You lose their belief that you are interested in them. You lose their hope that there is room for growth.

All of which could be alleviated by the good habits I saw in the CEO. Take notes. Ask clarifying questions. Give context to misunderstanding.

You Don’t Always Train On What You Have Learned

What I saw in the CEO didn’t trickle down to the rest of his team because he has neither set the expectation nor trained on the behavior that he wants to see.

I honestly think he just hasn’t thought about it, or that he thinks he delegated such training and was learning from me that it didn’t stick.

What if, in meetings you lead, people know that you value great questions as much as good input?

What if, in meetings you lead, you train on the value of asking follow-up questions to another’s assertions, and that you applaud when you see it done?

You get what you celebrate.

You also get what you train for.

Many times I have heard leaders say, “You make a great point.” I want to hear them say as much, “That’s a great question.”

The payoff is paydirt.

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