Do you know the story of the Emperor’s New Clothes?
Here’s a summary: <Spoiler Alert>
- The emperor is conned into believing he is wearing magnificent clothes, even though he can’t see them.
- The townspeople are afraid to admit they can’t see them either, so they pretend they’re beautiful.
- A young child finally says what everyone else knows: “But he isn’t wearing anything!”
- We all knowingly nod and assure ourselves we would have been the child.
Of course we would have said something.
Would we?
Because at work, we often do exactly what the townspeople did.
We see the problem. We know the plan isn’t working. We have concerns about a decision. We know what is hurting us.
And yet, we don’t say anything.
We pride ourselves on being a supportive team player. We don’t want to offend someone. We don’t want to create conflict. We don’t want to be seen as negative or difficult. We’re being nice.
So we nod.
And everyone leaves the room knowing there was something important that wasn’t said.
It felt like we were being nice, but the end result was downright mean.
Sometimes the kindest thing we can do for our colleagues and our organization is to tell them what we see.
And we can’t do that if “supportive” means nice.
The antidote is to redefine what “being a supportive team player” looks like in your organization. Speak openly about that supporting each other means making challenging observations. We are helping others be successful by sharing information even if it’s uncomfortable. Saying, “that doesn’t make sense to me,” shouldn’t be met with defense, it should be appreciated as a gift.
Leaders might find out their clothes are invisible if they simply ask:
- What isn’t being said?
- How might this not work?
- What would an outsider challenge about our approach?
