During our December Recognition Monday meeting, Aimee Gibbs was asked to speak about one of Highpoint’s Fundamental Behaviors. She spoke on the principle of “get clean on expectations.”
Recognition Monday is a companywide meeting held each month to recognize employee achievements, celebrate our wins, and refocus our team on the agency’s annual goals.
Aimee’s talk is full of tools and practices we can use to get clear on expectations.
Read it below:
Create clarity and avoid misunderstandings by discussing expectations upfront. Establish mutually understood objectives and deadlines for all projects, issues, and commitments. When appropriate, confirm your communication by asking others to repeat back their understanding to ensure total clarity and agreement.
Did you know that nearly half of all U.S. employees don’t know what’s expected of them at work. Employees tend to be less engaged at work when they do not have a clear understanding of what’s required of them. Research has shown that only 32% of U.S. employees and 21% of employees worldwide are engaged at work. That’s a lot of wasted human resource. People want clarity. They need a direction to follow and need something to work towards. So let’s change things and start getting clear on expectations.
Whether you are a manager, a team leader or just a fellow employee it is important to set clear expectations with one another when working on an objective. Knowing how to set these expectations can be the key to a productive workplace.
- Be crystal clear on the vision – What is the objective and what you want the end result to look like. Not just what you want done, but the results you want to achieve when the objective is completed.
- Be clear on who is responsible and who is accountable – Someone who is ‘responsible’ is the one doing the actual work and there can be more than one person in this role – The accountable person is the one who gave the instructions and will help guide the responsible person to the finished task.
- Discuss Timelines / Deadlines – make sure all parties aware of these and they are clear, measurable, and achievable.
- Allow for Feedback and Dialogue – have the responsible party repeat the objective. This will allow you to identify potential gaps and opportunities to fine-tune the objective.
- Communicate & Follow-up – Schedule regular check-ins determine if the objective is still on track, if help is needed or if a change to the objective has occurred. This is the opportunity to ask questions & to provide feed-back.
By setting clear expectations, we can avoid confusion, achieve clarity, foster engagement, and enhance productivity for the common objective.
