Does this look familiar?
You: OK, great! I’ll send you the invite for tomorrow at 3.
Them: Sounds good. Looking forward to it.
And then silence. Or worse, they accept the meeting but then ghost you.
How about this one?
You: To confirm, you’ll have this ready for tomorrow?
Them: Yes! It’s my highest priority.
Tomorrow rolls around, and nothing. Or maybe it’s “done,” but it’s not what you discussed and certainly not what you need.
Ever been here?
You: So you’ll help introduce me to that person?
Them: Yes, of course! I’d be happy to help.
And then it never happens.
We’re quick to judge. We feel like the other person is lazy or incompetent. We get frustrated, and we complain to the poor souls who happen to be standing around within earshot.
It’s not true. The other person isn’t lazy or incompetent.
What is true, however, is that the other person doesn’t care about our thing as much as we do. How could they? They’re not us.
As Seth Godin says, “The person we’re counting on doesn’t see what we see, doesn’t know what we know and might not even want what we want.”
There are two important leadership lessons here. The first is that when counting on someone else to help, I need to create the conditions for success. The second is that I need to care about them first.
Both of those are my jobs.
