People Are Confused - What Should I Do?

I’m a fly on the wall during a client’s departmental quarterly planning meeting when someone completely Rhythm 4 Eliminates Confusion unsolicited said, “I love Rhythm. I finally know what my job is.”

It’s fair to say we’ve all had times when we weren’t crystal clear about what our job really was. Whether we were starting a new role, getting used to the latest reorganization, or, navigating our path with a vague job description on their job scorecard as our map, we were moving forward with a ‘fake it till you make it’ mantra.

Sometimes we knew were confused and maybe even drowning but, we either didn’t have the confidence to ask for help, or worse, we thought we were pretty darn spectacular and the confused looks and negative feedback were a sign that either they are jealous or we’re too mensa. Or both.

Think of your team and consider someone who, for whatever reason, is not living up to his or her potential. Could she be confused? Are your initiatives getting done in the manner and timeframe you expect? Does your team know exactly what needs to be done and what success looks like?

You know confusion is setting in when your team doesn’t have:

Purpose. A way to visually see how the initiative they are working on is driving the organization’s strategy forward.

Focus. A narrowed list of 3-5 clear priorities to work on each quarter.

Definition of success. A clear description or metric of what success will look like in each priority by the end of the quarterly 13-week race.

Alignment. The ability to see and collaborate on all of the cross-functional work being done to move the initiative forward so that dependencies are called up and barriers moved.

Rhythm. The ability to meet weekly with your team to solve problems and make adjustments so that all priorities end the quarter strong.

Thinking of your initiatives, which of the above levers could you have pushed a bit harder?

I’m really excited about our latest version of Rhythm that is an even more powerful way to ensure I hear more and more of, “I finally know what my job is.”

Check it out for yourself. I’m sure everyone will still be jealous of your mensa ways but, only because you came up with the solution to wiping away the cobwebs of confusion.