Onboarding for Culture Work when the Boss is not on board
Dear Hunter,
My organization is in the middle of a re-organization. I am getting two new team members, one as a supervisee and the other as a peer. I want to give them a good welcome, and help them to join me and my colleagues in the healthy culture we have been working on. Collaboration, respect, and a learning and growth focus are some of the ways we are improving our team.
My problem is that the senior-most supervisor, my boss, doesn’t operate this way. It’s making me feel trapped in terms of how I work with our new team members. If I talk about what we are working on as our group expectations, it will make it very obvious that the senior person does not act like this. If I don’t talk about the culture we want and the work we are doing for it, they won’t know how we want to work together and how we can support each other. And we won’t keep moving in that direction.
Is there something I can do to help onboard these new team members into the team we want, without sounding like I’m criticizing our boss and creating drama?
Thanks,
Rock and a Culture Place
Dear Rock’n’Culture,
I see your quandary.
I also see a leader who is motivated, aspirational, emotionally intelligent, and compassionate. Your question and the way you describe the situation tells me that you are invested in your team’s progress in culture, and that you are considering what is best for the team and the individuals in it.
Thank you for the work you are doing. It is important, and, as your question points out, complex.
I think the answer to your question is relatively simple. I also want to offer some suggestions, if and when they seem wise to act on, for how to help your boss join the movement toward a healthy culture.
Go ahead and do what you have in mind to tell the new team members what you and the team do to be collaborative, supportive and growth-focused. As you do this, be specific about what behaviors and approaches you want to see.
Providing specific direction on the positive behaviors you want to see, the team values in action, threads this tricky needle by achieving two things:
This is the easiest way for people to join you in these behaviors. It’s clear and practical.
This is also the way to steer clear of sounding like you are criticizing your boss. You aren’t talking about what you don’t want to see.
Example, using a common healthy-culture practice:
You want people to give constructive feedback and hold each other accountable, with a focus on process and opportunity to improve in the future. (Instead of calling each other out in meetings for failures and missed opportunities.) Teach your feedback model to your new team members, and talk about "recognition in the group, redirection in private.”
You are thinking ahead to the moment when the new team members see what you already know: The senior boss does not work in some of the positive ways you would like to see. The best course of action for you here is to DO NOTHING. Do not try to get ahead of this awkward realization. Let it happen.
If doing nothing is uncomfortable, like watching two slow-moving cars headed for a collision, you can help your anxiety by preparing what you will say when a new team member asks you about this discrepancy. You can say something like this (after you edit to reflect your situation):
“I agree. I am looking for opportunities to support new habits when it comes to accountability and clear delegation. What’s great about this leader is their loyalty to our team and their resourcefulness in keeping us busy and funded.”
For how to help your boss move in the right direction, my advice is a version of the same, with a serious eye toward your safety in that relationship.
If there’s enough trust between you two, ask your boss for help standardizing best practices. To continue with feedback as an example, you could say something like, “I have seen good results with offering feedback in this way, and I have been supporting this format for feedback with the team. Do you think it’s something we can standardize? Would that be comfortable for you?”
If your boss appreciates evidence, find some published articles with the evidence base for what you are working on with the team.
If trust is low between you and your boss, it may not be a good idea to propose behavior change, under the heading of standardizing team habits or otherwise. In that case, continue to lead by example, and to support your team in the changes the group finds effective for a healthy learning culture.
You might be surprised how the team influences the habits and enforced norms of the senior-most team member.
I hope this helps. Let me know how it goes.
Best of luck,
Hunter
P.S. For further reading, here are a few past blogs that relate to your situation:
How to Upgrade Organizational Culture Even When You Are Not at the Top
Quandary Mat - Improving Team Culture When Wider Culture is Same-Ole Top-Down
Managing Up - 12-ish Questions to Ask Your Boss to Help Her and Help Her Help You