“Why doesn’t our management listen to us, although we are the experts and know how it works?” a participant in my expert program asked me a while back. In cooperation with the customer, I developed a program for an international luxury goods manufacturer in 2016 that strengthens the ability of experts to convey their points of view more convincingly. The aim is to make greater use of their expertise in management decisions. Fewer political decisions are to be made, fewer loud voices are to be heard, and instead the voices of those who are intensively involved in the subject matter are to be considered.

 

Ignoring expert opinions – refusing to honor the prophet in his own country

As a consultant and coach I have been involved in the corporate world for 25 years. It continues to amaze me that the management prefers to listen to consultants rather than to their own employees who have been dealing with a specific subject for years. Does the prophet not have any honor in his own country? And how efficient would it be if expert knowledge were better utilized? This topic and thus also the expert program are extremely close to my heart. That is why it really saddened me when it, like so many face-to-face events, fell victim to the coronavirus pandemic.

  • Physically bringing an international team together in one place? Impossible due to the travel restrictions!
  • Physically working on presence and self-assurance? Sigh…
  • Practicing to channel emotions via Zoom? Forget it!

But well, you can’t force anything in life. The only thing left to do is to try and make the best of it. So I went surfing a lot and then there was the epic exchange with my long-lost friend and colleague, Jonathan. Jonathan and I share two passions: developing pragmatic approaches to organizational change – and cooking. At the end of October we had the brilliant idea to cook a goose. I wanted to buy it spontaneously on October 24 at Wild & Geflügel, an established specialty store in Cologne’s Südstadt district. The saleswoman gave me an irritated look when I asked for a goose and explained that it would only be available around the time of St. Martin’s Day. But she said that she could offer me duck instead. But since the duck was much smaller than a goose, she suggested that I prepare two duck legs in addition to the duck. She said – “Stuff the duck legs inside the duck. 30 minutes before the end of the roasting time you then take them out of the duck again and put them into a roasting dish.” I repeated the instructions to make sure I had understood them correctly.

 

Ego or insecurity – acting against better judgment

So far, so good. But when it came to preparing the duck, Jonathan and I became skeptical and decided – “What a load of nonsense! We’re not going to do that. Stuff the duck legs into the duck? No way!” Instead, we prepared the legs separately. Jonathan and I work together in the kitchen like clockwork. We served the duck on time. High five! The duck was wonderfully tender and crispy. With the legs, however, we had completely misjudged the cooking time. After my son had chewed around on the tough leg for 10 minutes with a pained expression on his face, it dawned on me that we should have listened to the advice of the saleswoman. Secretly I asked both my son and the saleswoman to forgive me. What had we done to the poor child and the high-quality duck legs? And dear saleswoman, I assure you that it has nothing to do with a lack of respect for you that we did not follow your advice. We just didn’t pay any attention.

The next day Jonathan said meekly – “We should have listened to the saleswoman!” In the past, such an experience would have caused me to blame myself endlessly. I would have gotten really upset even over such a trivial matter. Since I have been working with Matt Griggs, my mantra has been – “Be kind to yourself.” Together with Matt I practice Kelee meditation and detachment. Letting go of the past and my anger is very liberating and so I said to Jonathan – “You know, that was actually the BEST learning experience.”

 

Mistakes are the best – because we learn from them

As usual, Jonathan understood immediately what I meant – “We’ll never do that again! Lesson learned. In the future we will listen to people who really know what they are talking about.” Einstein is believed to have said – “Learning is experience. Everything else is just information.” As simple as that.

A few days after the duck leg fiasco, Thorsten, head of sales at a very successful company, had scheduled a coaching session with me. He complained to me about his new CEO, who has been in charge of the company for six months. The CEO had his doubts about Thorsten’s sales strategy, even though sales had actually increased in 2020 and had helped the company achieve a double-digit rate of return, as always. Instead of continuing with the tried-and-tested regional concept, the CEO now wants to rely on a local strategy.

Thorsten was close to despair – “Lara, I used all my powers of persuasion and explained to the CEO that we had already tried this several times in the past but that it hadn’t worked. He just won’t listen to me. Now I even have to assign some of my employees to this nonsense!” Thorsten became increasingly angry.

I asked him – “What does it mean to you that your CEO won’t listen to you?”
Thorsten – “I find it disrespectful and ignorant!”
I responded – “That is one possibility. The other is that sometimes we just have to try things ourselves to understand that they don’t work.”

I told Thorsten the duck leg story. We had a good laugh.

 

Take it personally – and suffer!

Me – “Thorsten, you can take your CEO’s approach personally. The question is – who suffers?”
Thorsten – “I do!”
Me – “You can rebel against it, fight against your boss. But you could also try to understand that you cannot stop him.”
Thorsten – “But it’s costing the company a lot of money.”
Me – “What was the rate of return again in your company?”
Thorsten – “20%”
Me – “I wonder how much it will decrease if you rely on the local concept for a year?”
Thorsten – “It will decrease by 15%.”
Me – “Your calculation may be accurate, but it does not change the fact that you cannot control your boss. The only form of control we have is self-control.”
Thorsten – “Are you saying that I should just give up?”
Me – “What would be a wise decision?”
Thorsten, skeptical – “To stop fighting?”
Me – “How many times did YOU try the local concept before you realized that it didn’t work?”
Thorsten – “A few times.”
Me – “You learn from experience. How about giving your CEO the same chance you had?”

 

Detachment – helping the brain to get unstuck

Thorsten visibly relaxed. Our brain is a brilliant problem-solver. Only sometimes it gets stuck with problems that we cannot solve. Detachment also means letting them go, accepting reality, and dealing wisely with the situation. Thorsten is one of those smart coachees who understand that. It is a privilege to work with someone like him. He tells me that since our coaching session, he has been finding it easier to take some of his CEO’s decisions less personally. Not everything is hunky-dory between the two of them, but it helps Thorsten to avoid unnecessary fights. This has something to do with wisdom and efficiency. I have not yet found out whether the CEO is aware of this. I would be very interested in his experience.

Prior to the lockdown, however, I had a feedback session with the managers whose employees attended the expert program. I was interested in finding out the extent to which they perceived changes in their employees. One manager, let’s call him Peter, spoke up – “My employee Daniel said: ‘I learned that I should not be so hard on myself.’” Peter paused. “And that I also shouldn’t be so hard on you, Peter.” My hope is that as a result Peter will also find it easier to listen to his employee in the right situations, because he knows what’s what. He is a really clever guy.