Our lives and interactions with other people are governed by expectation.
Sometimes, these expectations are clear.
- They’re written down in black & white for everyone to see.
- They’re documented in the Employee Handbook.
- They’re explicitly listed in a contract that tells you what you can and cannot do.
Collectively, we can call these explicit agreements.
(Whether they’re fair is a separate matter. But at the very least, we know about them.)
The more transparent the guidelines, the more we understand what’s expected of us.
Clear boundaries provide constraints we can work with.
Rather than needing to make every decision from the ground up (i.e. nothing off the table), we know what our limits are.
It’s restriction – productive restriction. Because exercising creativity and making good choices gets a whole lot easier when we know what our goal is.
The trouble starts when we think that all we need to worry about are these explicit parameters.
The full range of rules we’re supposed to follow encompass far more than what we’re told, what we read, or what we see from the outside looking in.
For every spoken agreement we’re aware of, there’s an unspoken expectation lurking just out of sight.
- It’s not a rule, but we all usually dress a certain way…
- When you talk to a client, you should do this, not that…
- Oh, we don’t do that around here…
- I thought that was obvious…
And even though they’re unspoken… the consequences of failing to meet them can hurt all the same.
However, the unspoken doesn’t need to remain unsaid.
As leaders, it’s worth asking:
- What standards am I holding people to that I haven’t told them about?
- Are these standards reasonable?
- Can I tell them, and make their lives easier?
- If these standards are unnecessary, can I drop them?
- Can I acknowledge that these are personal preferences – not requirements?
However we do it, and whatever gets us moving in the right direction… it’s worth shedding light on unspoken, unchecked expectations.
Because the clearer we are, the easier collaboration becomes.