Hippie CEO Life #07 - Do You Have a Minute to Talk?
May 27, 2022
“Do you have a minute to talk?
Have you ever been the unlucky recipient of an email or meeting invite from your boss with no context, no agenda, just a one terrifying line “quick chat” or “minute to talk”?
If so, and if you are like me, this caused instant terror and panic. Your mind starts racing, retracing your steps, “Did I make a big mistake?”, “I’m sure I’m getting fired.”, “Did i take too much vacation?”
Chances are, the meeting is very benign, the boss wants to talk about a product idea, perhaps get your take on the current state of the team, or maybe wants to give you a preverbal pat on the back for a doing such a great job on that last project you worked on however…
Regardless of the actual purpose of the meeting, there is no excuse for someone who holds a position of authority over you to send such vague messages.
So why is this happening? Well, we have a serious issue in the corporate world. We tend to identify individual contributors that are excelling in their role and as a way to recognize their contribution to the company, and to give them more money, we promote them into management. A quick update in the HR system to set the new corporate approved title and pay rate and congratulations, you are now a manager — NO TRAINING NECESSARY!!!
But management IS a skill that requires constant training and study. Pretending that we can simply promote an individual contributor into a management position without any support, guidance, or training has proven to be a disastrous decision.
From my experience, the “Do you have a minute to talk?” issue has two primary root causes:
#1 - Lack of Empathy
Bosses sending out a “Quick Chat” meeting invite lack empathy. Full stop. The fact that they are able to send out such a message, clearly shows that they are unable to put themselves in the shoe’s of their employee because if they could, they would never hit SEND, SEE: We don’t provide training to managers on how to have empathy.
#2 - There Are Just A Lot of Really Bad Bosses
Why do we panic when we get a vague meeting invite from the boss? Well, for most people, they only tend to hear from the higher ups when something has gone wrong, when their actions need to be corrected, or maybe something even worse. The reality is, there are a lot of terrible managers out there that only have time for their team when something is wrong, SEE: We don’t provide training to employees on how to be good managers.
So what do we do? We aren’t going to solve the lack of training issue on a large scale so we have to start within our own companies, perhaps even our own teams.
👉🏼 MANAGERS: If you are guilty of this, STOP. Make a commitment today that you will no longer send out any vague messages or meeting invites to your team. Next, ask your company for leadership training, if your request is rejected, you are at the wrong company.
👉🏼 TEAM MEMBERS: Push back. If your manager is guilty, tell them. “Hey, when you send out meeting invites like this, it freaks me out. I would greatly appreciate it if you included a brief agenda or an explicit reason for the meeting. If your request is not honored or has other negative repercussions, you are at the wrong company.
Regardless of your title or position within the company, a little bit of empathy can go a long way. Reject the toxic notion of, “It’s just business.” It’s not just business, it’s personal.
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