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The Culture+ Blog

Insights to help you create a compelling and connected culture

Leaders’ actions signal expectations

Our actions as leaders create expectations. As you move higher up in an organization, people start looking at you more closely. They look more closely at what you wear. They look more closely at what office hours you keep. They look more closely at the words you use. When I was working with the design team on my recently published book, I tended to send them materials and edits and ideas on the weekends. The weeks were so full so I pushed my book work to the weekends. Then, I noticed that some on my team were responding back to me on the weekends. It dawned on my that my weekend communications were creating an expectation that they should be working (or at least responding to me) on the weekend. The following week I corrected the expectation. I explained that they should expect to get stuff from me on the weekends, but that I didn’t expect any response or work until their normal business hours. I missed a rookie leader blind spot: Our actions as leaders create expectations. If we aren’t careful we can signal expectations that may not be what we intend.

by Jonathan

Jonathan Wilson is the CEO of Sandcastle, a leadership training and development consultancy. He frequently speaks and writes about building high performance teams. Jonathan regularly presents his latest findings and insights to business and government leaders at local, state, and national association events (both in-person and virtual). His first book, Future Leader: Rebooting Leadership to Win the Millennial and Tech Future is available now.

Tagged: Leadership

Published on: May 14, 2019

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