When my oldest son, Elijah, was three he loved to have me draw pictures for him.

One day, he ran up to me with a sheet of blank paper and a marker. “Draw, Daddy!”

Usually, he’s specific about what he wants me to draw: A snake, a spider, a duck. This time he didn’t seem to care what I drew. He yanked the paper away from me just as I began to draw.

He was three. I didn’t think much about it.

Then he ran back to me with another blank piece of paper and said, “Draw, Daddy!” I started to draw another animal. Again, just as I started, he said, “Thank you!” He jerked the paper away and ran off.

This repeats five or six times. Finally, I asked him what he was doing.

“I’m recycling!”

Sure enough, he had found a cardboard box somewhere and was conscientiously filling it with newly used paper.

I guessed that they were teaching recycling at his daycare. He, evidently, had missed the underlying concept. I thought it was cute. Then I pondered what the right parental response was.

As I pondered, he finally reached a point of enough paper in the box. He took the papers out of the box and arranged them on the floor. “Play with me, Daddy!”

I finally understood. They used recycled paper for games in their classroom. He wanted to play a game. He needed recycled paper for the game.

He created the recycled paper.

I have to say, I felt proud that he had planned out that little project.

I never figured out what to teach him about recycling. I did figure out that I should play with him.

People Can Self-Manage When They Know “Why?”

People want to know ‘Why?’ This is not a Millennial thing. Simon Sinek didn’t invent the question.

This is actually a universally true human trait – unless someone has been damaged in some way. Healthy people like to know “why” they are doing something.

The Leadership Mistake: Leader’s Focus on What

Most leaders mistakenly focus on what. This is a mistake. Leader’s should focus on why.

When people are only told what to do – they develop their own reason for why.

Most often, they will arrive at the wrong conclusion. This is not their fault.

Time invested in explaining why helps others apply the what more judiciously. They need less of our input and oversight. This frees up our time.

Robert Cialdini of Arizona State University, and the author of Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, demonstrated that explaining why is a powerful tool for impacting behavior.

One study clearly illustrates this: Student researchers would ask to cut into a line of people waiting to make copies. When they asked “Can I cut in line?” they were most often refused. However, if they said, “Can I cut in line? I’m in a hurry.” They were frequently allowed to cut in.

They had provided a why.

Values – The Heart of Why

Many organizations have developed value statements.

However, these are rarely the powerful and motivating tools they could be. This is because most consultants, HR teams, and marketing departments know the what of planning. (“We should do a Values Exercise….”) but they also don’t know why it should be done.

If an organization chooses to explore their values, it should be for the purpose of getting clear about why something is important. It should provide reason and guidance to the what.

The strategic goals of an organization, or how they are pursued, should be clear manifestations of values.

Policies should help describe behavior that best demonstrates these values. Hiring practices and performance assessments should be informed by values.

If used well, clarifying your values creates an extraordinarily powerful tool for focusing leadership, filtering priorities and improving decision making.

Practical Whys

Sometimes the why is very practical.

When staff understands the why behind certain policies or practices, they are able to exercise better discretion when faced with new situations.

When staff understands that an organization understands the intended purpose or value of a decision – whether strategic or policy or otherwise – they are more likely to support it.

They are more likely to make the right decisions in an ambiguous context. They are more likely to self-manage well. Because they understand what is ultimately trying to be achieved.

Management should never fault staff for asking, “Why?”

We also shouldn’t blame them if we’ve trained them to stop wondering. If we find that they will only do precisely what they were told to do, with the effort they were required to put into it.

We should expect a higher management burden if we don’t explain, “Why.”

Sometimes an old why no longer fits the current situation.

There is an old story about a young mother learning to cook the Christmas ham. Her young daughter asks her why she cuts the ends off each side of the ham. The young mother replies, “It makes it taste better! Your grandma makes the best ham ever and this is how she always made it.”

The young girl didn’t find this to be persuasive. She went and asked her grandmother. Her grandmother answered, “I don’t know, it’s just how my mother always used to make ham. I never thought to ask.”

The girl finally went to her great-grandmother and asked about the ham. “Oh, my!” Exclaimed her great-grandmother. “Back in those days our oven was so small, we couldn’t fit a whole ham into it. I had to cut the ends off just to get it in the oven!”

My Son’s Leadership

If you are a parent, you know that from the minute your child is born there is a power struggle for leadership in your home.

Does the child influence the parent more? Does the parent influence the child more? It’s tough to say.

Elijah was learning how to influence me to accomplish something he wanted. To play a game.

He only communicated what. He asked me to draw. Again and again. We spent a lot of time creating recyclable paper – time that could have been spent playing the game.

In the context of parenting a three-year-old, this is quality time. Efficiency isn’t that important.

It isn’t quality time when you are managing staff.

If he had explained why to me, at the beginning, I could have helped him get to where he wanted, with less waste, faster.

It’s true in the context of your leadership and management as well.

• What is one strategic area where explaining “Why?” will help create greater alignment and focus on your team or organization?
• What is one policy or procedure where your staff would be better served if they understood the why behind it?
• Is there anything you are doing and you don’t know Why? What are you going to do about that?

Take good care,

Christian

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P.S. Would you like to talk to me, one-on-one, about how you can rapidly increase your ability accomplish your priorities, decrease your unwanted workload, boost your profits or do more of what you love?

95% of my clients report positive results within the first 90 days of working together. Additionally, they report adding between $120K and $1M in new, annual revenue or savings.  Contact me to learn more: christian@vantageconsulting.org or 907 522-7200