Quandary Mat: My Team Sets Boundaries Against Me!
Dear Hunter,
I manage a team of seven in a large organization. I listen to my team and do my best to take care of them. I talk about the importance of boundaries and self-care. I want them to limit working hours and tell me when they are too busy. I’m trying to do that for myself!
But I created a monster. Now that’s all people say when I give people work or ask people to cover for each other. Recently, I had a scheduling conflict, and asked three different people to cover a meeting for me, and they all said no. One used the word “boundaries.” I felt like I couldn’t say anything because they were doing what I talked about. How do I get people to take work while not being a hypocrite about boundaries?
Signed, Reboundaries Boss
Dear Reboundaries,
Ouch. You are doing the right thing in encouraging people to take care of themselves. As you know, there are many reasons this is important. But that effort has backfired. You are in a bit of a trap.
To help you get yourself out of this pickle, let’s look at boundaries, delegation, and a bit about individual capacity.
It sounds like you and your team are in a common trap when thinking about boundaries: Thinking of a “boundary” as a one-sided personal brick wall. “I do this. I don’t do that.” Of course we do need some never-nope-not-doing-it rules, for our own safety, for ethical reasons, etc. You could think of those as never-events, like medication errors in hospital care.
For boundaries, though, we want to be more sophisticated and think about those as agreements between people, in the context of the work of the team. They can be individual boundaries but require communication and commitment with others. Clear, but also flexible as conditions change.
Shane Snow recommends using the simple conditional phrasing “If x, then y.” Here’s how I use this for one of my time and schedule boundaries, starting with my explanation for how I work: “I keep Fridays open for writing and for meeting big deadlines. I don’t book meetings if I can help it. I am on email less than other workdays. If you need me in an emergency on a Thursday or Friday, then text me or call me.”
Very different from “No Friday meetings.” My “if/then” conditional boundary tells people what I’m doing for the team on Fridays, what I am not doing, and how to work with me if my boundary can’t be honored on a certain Friday.
Another example: If you want my best thinking on something, then give me at least two days for shorter and smaller things, or three days if it’s a bigger document or data report.
That’s boundaries. You could teach this and then have people write up some “if/then” boundaries to discuss with you and then the rest of the team.
Thoughts about delegation to people who feel like they are already too busy to take on more stuff.
This is a universal experience for supervisors, project managers, parents who lead kids’ sports teams, leaders of volunteers at churches and community groups, the editor of the high school yearbook, and on and on. Not to trivialize your work, but this is a Life Skill.
Delegation requires using your power. You will have to push people to do what’s required, which can be uncomfortable for you. Which brings to mind a relevant leadership cliche: Leadership often requires being comfortable making other people uncomfortable. So they rise to the challenge, so the work gets done well, so the team can succeed.
How you approach people matters. Unless you have options for who you assign work to, or whether you hire a consultant or temp worker, your question isn’t “do you want to do this?” Your question is “how can I support you in doing this?” This switch in approach puts you in the position of coaching and supporting your team member, instead of cajoling, begging, bargaining.
A coaching approach could sound like this: “I need you to take this new thing. Let me know tomorrow your ideas for how to work it into your current workload, and we can go from there.” You aren’t leaving the person alone. You are leaving the new responsibility clearly on their plate. You expect them to figure out how to say yes.
You may need to do some of that bargaining. Negotiation, let’s call it. If you believe the person is currently too busy to fit the new thing in, can you extend another deadline so the person can do this thing now? Can you enlist another team member to help? If it’s a now-thing, can the person skip a meeting on another project to do this new thing?
Final thought for now, about individual capacity: A bucket can only hold so much water. A day can only hold so many meetings and so much desk time to do tasks. It’s also true that a bucket can feel more full, more heavy than it is, if I am worried about something while I’m working, if I have something going on at home, or if I’m just more tired these days for whatever reason. If the person won’t budge from saying “no” to a new thing, then you can turn this into an exploration of capacity.