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Surviving Your Own Decisions

By Newton Holt

You’re the CEO, the one who makes the calls. You can’t make everyone happy, as the cliché goes. But they can make you miserable – if you give them good reason.

Just because CEOs are expected to make the tough choices – and to take the heat when things go wrong – doesn’t mean it’s any easier on them. When the outcome is critical and the next call is yours, you might save the ship but anger the crew. Here’s how to handle discontent before it becomes mutiny.

Executives, particularly those in the top spot, have to make a lot of tough decisions. And while you won’t find the following phrase in CEO contracts and job descriptions, perhaps it should be, in big, bold letters: “Candidate must make the most righteous decisions he or she humanly can, as well as be prepared to defend those decisions against an onslaught of people who think you’ve lost your mind, have their own agendas, think you’re an idiot, or just plain don’t agree. Must be able to deal with being alternately lionized and demonized, depending on overall popularity of decisions, not whether decisions are good for the organization. Significant experience with delusional subjects who believe all issues are absolutely critical a plus.”

For CEOs, a capacity for tackling tough decisions and grappling with them until they get the “right” answer may be the very quality that makes them so well suited for their jobs. But very few people have ever had to make a decision in which life and death literally hung in the balance.

One who has is Rick Grimes, CAE, president/CEO of the Assisted Living Federation of America. At 23 years of age, when some of his counterparts were cutting their teeth in entry-level positions, Grimes was a first lieutenant in the Vietnam War. Says Grimes, “There hasn’t been a single decision I’ve made since Vietnam that has had the impact on individual lives the way my decisions did then.”

Grimes’ battlefield calls meant whether people lived or died. While his current decisions may not bear the weight of life or death, Grimes doesn’t take them or the effects they have on others lightly. Grimes says his leadership experience in the Vietnam War gave him a measuring stick by which to compare the magnitude of his decisions. But that doesn’t mean that making tough calls isn’t still arduous, even grueling.

“When you’re leading a national organization, your decisions ultimately impact many, many lives – often well into the future,” says Grimes. “So I’ve learned to surround myself with very smart, confident, and committed staff who make the day-to-day decisions and advise me on strategic decisions. And, of course, I look to my board of directors for a reality check on big decisions that impact our industry. Internally, personnel decisions can be among the toughest. Unless someone’s been caught stealing or doing something grievously wrong, decisions to terminate someone are especially difficult. I always ask myself, ‘Is this person underperforming because I’m underleading – or because they are in the wrong job or the wrong organization?’”

Grimes’ statement illustrates the predicament CEOs find themselves in every day: A tough decision arises and the CEO is paid to take care of it, as conventional wisdom goes, so he or she does take care of it. But like Grimes, the best CEOs always question the validity of their own decisions and the methods by which they arrive at them, whether those decisions involve personnel or something broader, such as the overall direction of the organization or the fate of a program or service.

The stars must align in a very special way indeed for any tough decision worth making not to involve some deal of backlash from those who are affected – whether that means your staff, your members, your board, or myriad other would-be-angered folks. The toughest decisions often are so tough because of their potential to be polarizing.

The bad news is that the aforementioned stars only array themselves so beneficially in fairy tales. But the good news is that you can minimize the backlash – or at least take some of the sting from it – by delivering your decision the right way and handling the backlash gracefully.

Surprises: only fun on birthdays

Surprises are great for parties, but they have no place in delivering unpopular or controversial decisions. If you’re about to hit people hard, they should know it’s coming. This is particularly true with staff, and even more so when it comes to terminations and layoffs. Unless you’re a sociopath (or “Chainsaw” Al Dunlap), firing people or laying them off is not a fun thing, no matter how ethically or compassionately you do it.

Says Carla Balakgie, CAE, executive director of the Electronic Transactions Association, “I was senior vice president at an organization that had to downsize its staff by 10 percent, maybe more. There’s no pleasant way to downsize – you’re going to hurt people, affect their lives, and damage the morale of the organization no matter how you do it.”

Balakgie adds that you can partially control the backlash and pain that is sure to come following a sweeping, dramatic decision such as a layoff, but there’s no way to avoid it. Balakgie and the organization she was with at the time communicated openly and often to the staff that there was going to be a layoff. “You must do everything you can to mitigate the impact to the association, and you have to realize that one approach isn’t going to work for everyone,” says Balakgie. “It’s like surgery: There will be pain, it takes time, and everyone reacts differently. Be honest, transparent, and willing to hear what comes back to you – and within reason, willing to be influenced by it. You can’t react to every whim. You’ll make yourself crazy. But you need to be able to filter out the larger themes and listen to those.

“You must keep stating and reframing your reasons behind the decision in a nondefensive manner,” she continues. “You must do everything you can, and then you’ll only get about 80 percent who are adequately prepared, and the other 20 percent will hit you like a truck. What you can’t gauge is the long-term effect on the organization and how long it will take you to recover.”

A sure way to make the fallout worse? Pretending it’s not there. Balakgie and others say it’s best to confront problems head on, even as they’re still messy and undefined. People may not yet know exactly what it is that they are angry, hurt, or upset about, but you can’t wait until you find out exactly what cut them before you begin to salve their wounds. Says Balakgie, “You really need to communicate as much as you can, both before the fallout and as it’s happening.”

But such openness is not something that comes naturally to most people, says Jamie Notter, principal of Notter Consulting and a specialist in conflict resolution. “When faced with a tough situation people basically say less – it’s uncomfortable, so they figure the best thing to do is not say as much or delay. I see that pattern all the time, but it doesn’t make sense. I think you get better reactions when you say more and say it sooner and say more of the truth upfront.”

Also important – in communicating any decision – is making sure that you have the whole picture, not just part of it, and that you do not have, or even appear to have, “pets.” Says Balakgie, “You have to make sure that you’re not overly aligned with one person or one constituency.” She recalls a situation where a powerful and influential volunteer leader had gained a reputation for divisiveness. Says Balakgie, the individual was “great at the job but so divisive that it was felt not just among staff and volunteers but in the rank-and-file membership. As the chief staff executive, I understood that one of the most important things I had to do to be credible was to mitigate all of the acrimony that resulted from this. I could not pick sides and had to make sure that I wasn’t seen as an instrument of this person’s will. Remaining impartial and transparent was the only way to ensure the confidence of the board and the members.” That meant often going against the divisive volunteer, who wielded a lot of power and influence. She adds, “I had to thread that needle very carefully, retaining the valuable contributions this person made without compromising the organization. It was very challenging at times, but it was the right thing to do. You have to be willing to do what you believe is the right thing, even at your own peril.”

Asserting your beliefs doesn’t necessarily mean taking a dramatic stand when it’s not called for. If you want backlash, then declare your point of view with an air of executive infallibility and absoluteness, and you’re sure to get it, says Balakgie. “I didn’t handle this situation in an explicit manner – I did it in how I behaved. I didn’t declare all of my opinions outright, and I didn’t necessarily take hard, confrontational stands,” she says. “I made my views clear, but I treated everyone like they had value. You have to have your own opinions and your own compass, but you also need to gather a lot of information and be willing to test your assumptions. Declaration is important at the right point in time, but where do you go from there? A declaration more often than not shuts the door on dialogue. You want that door to be open as much and as long as possible.”

Make the invisible visible

While layoffs and firings might be the first things that come to mind when one thinks “tough and unpopular decisions,” they are by no means the only such decisions. Nor are they usually the most complicated. Layoffs are usually financially necessitated; terminations are usually the result of an unproductive employee or a shift in the organization’s direction. The reasons for such actions are generally plain to see, and they’re just hard to swallow. But when the tough decision involves raising dues, sunsetting or retooling a popular program, or changing the direction of the organization, the drivers behind the decision aren’t as apparent. It’s up to the CEO to do two things – explain and prepare. Explain the reasons behind the decision, in multiple ways for multiple audiences, and be prepared to defend the decision. You have an obligation to assure your audiences that change isn’t hurled like lightning from Mount Olympus. You have to make the invisible visible.

If this sounds like a situation politicians find themselves in, David Patt, CAE, executive director of the Association of Running Event Directors, says you shouldn’t be surprised at the similarities. Says Patt, one of the most important skills a CEO can possess is political savvy – not in the Machiavellian sense but more toward the notion that you have to answer to, serve, and ameliorate the concerns of several different constituencies. “We have a reluctance to use political skills and even more of a reluctance to acknowledge them. You have to be a good politician in that you have to listen to all of your constituencies,” he says.

Patt’s organization found itself in a situation that could deeply offend its Jewish members. It was holding a race in March, and by city law, couldn’t apply for the race permit until January 1 of the same year. At large events such as races, police security is needed. “What we didn’t realize,” said Patt, “was that the police assigned to the race were police academy students – who happened to be graduating from police academy during the time of the race and obviously couldn’t help us. Problem was we had already signed our hotel contract, so we had to move the race two weeks later.”

The day of the race was the first day of Passover. “We got a couple of angry calls,” says Patt. “People weren’t angry that we held the race on the first day of Passover per se; they were angry that we should have known better. And they were right: We wouldn’t have held the race on Easter.”

To alleviate the fallout, Patt sent a letter to all members explaining what happened and why. Following that, Patt contacted a Jewish member who volunteered to write a letter explaining why the organization had no choice but to hold the race during Passover in an attempt to assure the membership that the scheduling problem was a gaffe, not a careless act of disrespect.

The fallout cooled and the race continues to be a success today. But says Patt about the scheduling mishap, “That was a real wakeup call for us to be more cognizant of our members’ diverse needs and preferences.”

What if you’re wrong?

So, you’ve made a tough call and you’re wrong. Welcome to the human race. Being in error isn’t nearly as big a deal as how you handle being told you’re wrong.

Says ETA’s Balakgie, “Nothing is more important than being able to admit when you’re wrong. You should work in concentric circles to build agreement and input from others to have as much consensus as you can. If you’re well intended and you still miss something big, you have to be prepared to listen to what comes from your staff, your members, your board. You do have to admit you’ve been wrong, without being a doormat and without being ripsawed by every comment.”

And sometimes, the toughest decision is deciding who needs to decide. Sure, you’re the CEO –but does that necessarily mean you need to be involved in absolutely every decision?

Says ALFA’s Grimes, “One of the decisions I make every day is, ‘Who should make the decision?’ Is it the executive committee? The board chair?A staff person? Me? Determining the level of the decision is one of the toughest decisions, and it’s one that I have to make 50 times a day. I have to think of the level and consequences and find the appropriate place for that decision to be made.”

Remember what we say about successful presidents: They’re only as good as their cabinet members. The same can be said of CEOs. Just as the board entrusts you with appropriate authority, do the same for your senior staff. You’re not protecting them or “taking one for the team” when you take a tough decision that your senior management could unknot, and you make it yours and yours alone. You might just be making trouble for yourself and taking opportunities out of their hands.

But, of course, that’s your call.

(Reprinted with permission, copyright May 2008, ASAE & The Center, Washington, D.C.)

Posted: Friday, August 15, 2008 12:00:00 AM. Modified: Friday, August 15, 2008 2:04:23 PM.

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