Chris Peters: Web Developer

Seth Godin blogged yesterday about problems we generally have in defining success. I loved his resolution to the problem:

. . . success is largely about keeping your promises.

I thought about this and realized that there is a major roadblock in keeping promises: communication. Of course, we all have heard many times that communication problems lead to most interpersonal problems. It’s almost a cliche at this point.

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management, business, communication, leadership

I confess that I’m not perfect at this, but there are some less than obvious things that should almost always be communicated when delegating promises or making promises yourself:

1. Deadlines on progress and task completion. These deadlines should always be a two-way conversation. If you are doing the delegating, ask your team member if the deadline is acceptable. Don’t shoot lightning bolts down from your ivory tower.
2. If the promise is big enough, communicate a sample on how success will be defined. Paint a picture of what success looks like and what failure looks like. I’ve also noticed that defining these boundaries helps out when someone has designer’s block.
3. Restate the promise. On the surface, this seems hokey. Someone needs to restate the promise at the end of the conversation. If the person making the promise does this, then it shows the requestor of the promise that the goal is understood. You may be surprised to find out that all of the details of the communication never really made it through.

I could go all business school on you and give more tips, but these are the ones I’ve found especially useful. Go to your neighborhood motivation seminar for more.