relationships
Your Personal Invitation is Inside: Harvard Business Review, Facebook, and YOU!
The man who can’t accept criticism can’t become great. – Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav
- Does giving feedback make you sweat?
- Does getting feedback make you sweat even more?
- Does your organization give feedback only during annual performance reviews?
- Would your professionals rather eat a bug than give lay leaders direct feedback – and
vice versa? - Does your culture feel too “nice” for negative feedback?
If any of these sounds like you, you’re invited to get some new skills, perspectives and confidence around giving and receiving feedback.
Please join me and Harvard Business Review for “How to Give and Receive Effective Feedback,” a 30-minute Facebook Live event beginning at 10 am EST on Thursday, December 15th. I’ll be sharing my top tips, tools and techniques, and you’ll have the opportunity to ask me questions and get some direction and support.
Click here to visit Harvard Business Review’s Facebook page to join me.
Click here to add this complimentary event to your calendar.
15 Ways to Break the Law of the Instrument
Psychologist Abraham Maslow once famously remarked: “When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” That’s known as The Law of the Instrument – and many of us have one or two well-worn instruments, tools, and approaches that we use to help our colleagues, friends and family solve problems.
I know this first-hand: A decade ago after I graduated from coaching school I realized that my version of The Law of the Instrument was, “When what you are is a coach, every problem looks coachable.” Since one of the most useful tools in the coaching toolkit is curiosity, I asked a lot of questions. I mean, a LOT of questions. It got to the point that I would ask my kids, “How was your day at school?” or “What would you like for dinner?” and would hear, in response, “Are you trying to coach me???”
Point taken. Even though Albert Einstein himself said, “The important thing is not to stop questioning,” the people around me said, “Please give your questioning a rest.”
Now, ten years and hundreds of clients later, I now have a wide range of instruments that I can use to be helpful, depending on whether someone wants direction, advice, support, empathy, instruction, problem-solving or yes, coaching. And it took a lot of work to cultivate a toolkit where I could feel equally comfortable pulling out any instrument and using it well. But the most important development for me was not assuming that I knew what help my client, colleague, friend or kid wanted or needed, but offering them a robust list of helpful approaches from which they could choose. Chances are, you have one or two well-worn instruments that you use regularly (such as problem-solving or brainstorming) and it might be time for you to add some new ones to your toolkit.
You might like the feel of a new instrument in your hand – and you might be able to help the people you work, volunteer and live with might have a breakthrough that wouldn’t have been possible with the tools you’ve been using.
Ready to break the Law of the Instrument? Here is my list of 15 new ones to offer:
- Listen without judgment
- Ask open-ended questions
- Play “Devil’s Advocate”
- Brainstorm 50 new ideas
- Empathize
- Connect you to an expert in the field
- Teach you a skill
- Share my own experience/path
- Give a pep talk/cheerlead
- Help you prioritize
- Take notes while you download your thoughts
- Help you develop evaluation criteria
- Do it along side you
- Send you articles, videos and other resources
- Fix it for you
What are some other instruments you use? Post below.
38 Ways to Say No (and Still Preserve the Relationship)
1. I’m not available then, but could be available on (insert date)
Would that date work?
2. Oh, I will be so disappointed to miss this!
3. While I would love to do that for you, [insert type of priorities] preclude it. I hope you understand.
4. I am so flattered that you asked but unfortunately cannot do that. Can I help you brainstorm someone who might be available?
5. Normally, I would say yes, but I have already committed to ________ at the same time.
6. Right now, I am saying no to all invitations (on this topic, at this timeframe, etc.).
7. I need to decline, but warmly request that you keep me in mind for future meetings/events. Would you please reach out again?
8. I try very hard not to make commitments I will likely need to cancel, and because of the timing here, I would likely need to cancel at the last minute, leaving you in a last-minute scramble to find someone else. Because of that, I will need to say no.
9. That sounds like a fantastic event/opportunity/cause, and I know that I will be sorry to miss it.
10. I cannot attend in person, but I wonder how I can help in some other way. Should we brainstorm ideas?
11. I don’t feel that this is the right fit for me. Can I share with you the kinds of project or priorities that DO feel like a good fit for you to know for down the road?
12. I am so grateful for the opportunity and for you thinking of me. However, I am in demand at the moment with appointments made months ago. I can also recommend x and y and z, who would be great
13. I can’t, but let me take a look at who might be available to fill in for me.
14. My schedule is completely booked for the next {insert timeframe}. Would you please reach back out after then?
15. I am so sorry to decline but I have a prior engagement. Here’s what I’d like to do, though: let me put a note in our files indicating that I needed to turn this request down so that next time, I can move your request to the front of the line.
16. Right now, I am only accepting requests related to X priority. Since this request seems to be about Y priority, let me put you in touch with someone who handles Y.
17. I have reached my [weekly/monthly/quarterly/annual] quota for [speaking engagements, consulting, meetings, panels, rallies, etc.]. Things should open up again by [insert month]. Please reach back out to me then.
18. I hate to admit this but I have already said yes to two events that day, and will need to cancel at least one of those. I don’t want to cancel two.
19. I have recently had some unexpected events come up and so I won’t be scheduling anything new at this time.
20. I will be out of town.
21. I don’t do X, as a rule.
22. I’m good at X, but not great at it. Let me suggest some people who are great at it.
23. It sounds like our budgets aren’t in the same ballpark. If you have flexibility, terrific. And if not, I completely understand and know that you’ll find someone great within your price-range.
24. I will need more information to make a decision. Can you please send me….?
25. I adore the cause, but simply can’t commit right now/I need to decline.
26. I don’t know and I don’t want to hold you up so feel free to ask someone else.
27. You’re so kind to think of me. Thank you. Sadly, I need to decline.
28. Not this time. When’s the next opportunity available for something like this?
29. If only I had a clone then I could be in two places at once!
30. I am heads-down on a project right now, and won’t be coming up for air for the next [insert timeframe].
31. When do you need to know by? I ask because if it’s in the next {week/month/quarter], I will need to say no.
32. Right now, I am only saying yes to very select opportunities that fall into [insert area of focus], and unfortunately this doesn’t meet the criteria.
33. I’m not available for that, but I know someone who is working on a common agenda/goal/objective. Let me connect you!
34. Others have made similar requests, and I have said no to all of those.
35. X is my top priority right now, so I am devoting all of my time to that.
36. With x # of this type of request coming in every month, I have had to limit the number of acceptances in order to make time for other business. I am at my limit.
37. I have committed to my clients that X would be my leading priority this year. For that reason, I will need to say no to this invitation in order to make good on my commitment.
38. Thank you so much, but no.
…and just for fun…
10 Things NOT to Say
1. You’re joking, right?
2. I have commitment issues.
3. This request is below my pay grade.
4. I wish I had the luxury of entertaining such a whimsical request.
5. What do I have to say to get you to understand that NO means NO?
6. I no longer commit to causes that make me feel like a hypocrite.
7. As if!
8. Sure, at half-past never.
9. Yuck!
10. N to the O.
