Letting More Fresh Air Into the Room

There are a few diseases for which the cure is more
dangerous than the affliction. Alethophobiaan intense, abnormal or illogical
fear of the truthis one of them.

It sounds like a rare and serious psychiatric disorder, but
Im betting that two out of three people suffer from alethophobia. And the
approved cure, administered by companies all over the world, is far worse than
the disease.

I call this cure legislated optimism, a practice largely
about ego, and our insistence on building a public story of our lives that we
can live with, even if its fantasy.

And the administrators of this cure, well, there truly are
people who believe that while they can handle the truth, the rest of us
cant. Perhaps they view us as the human version of fainting goats or suspect
that when we understand what a dreadful hash theyve made of things, well
throw them out. They could be right on the second point. We are not fond of
those whove made one wrong move after another, while lying to us along the
way.

Theres a popular myth that its lonely at the top, that
leaders must privately bear their crossesthat decision making falls to them and
them alone, which requires them to hole up in their private brainpans, pull the
shades, and ruminate until theyve arrived at a conclusion.

Another false belief some leaders hang on to is that if they
tell people how dicey things are and that the immediate future doesnt look
good, their best people will leave, customers will desert them, the stock will
plummet, the board of directors will hand the CEO his head on a plate and …

These things only happen when we disclose seriously bad news
that no one has seen coming. But when were honest with ourselves and others
from the start, we can spot trouble coming and form a sound plan, allowing us
to turn things around.

Take what happened in 2008, after Starbucks had layoffs at
every level, shuttered dozens of stores, and experienced a significant decline
in sales. CEO Howard Schultz didnt gloss over these facts; he stated them
openly at the annual sales meeting, admitting that there was no silver bullet
for fixing the problem. At first Starbucks stock dropped and no one wanted to
touch the company. But, because Schultz fully disclosed the problem, talked
down expectations, crafted and implemented a sound plan, and kept revenue
moving up, the company and stock eventually began to rise again.

Radical transparency can be rough. When you fling open the
doors, tell the truth as you understand it and invite input, youll get it and,
as most of us have experienced, not all input is easy or pleasant to hear. If
you keep inviting it anyway and if you are very lucky, you will hear from your
contrarians, those whose thought processes seem to work quite differently from
most. They see thingspossibilities, problems, solutionsothers miss. Pure
gold.

Dave Daly, the CEO of Evergreen-Washelli, the largest
cemetery in the state of Washington, was my favorite contrarian. During his 13
years as a member of one of the CEO groups I chaired, Dave could always be
depended on to throw a wrench into our conversations, just as we were about to
concur on a recommendation. We were initially irritated when Dave, after
listening quietly for a long time, would say things like What if instead of
rearranging the furniture, you moved it to a different floor? Or What if its
not the cat that needs skinning? But eventually we had to acknowledge one
thingthe man was brilliant.

So if the debate in your company is between those who
believe the company should turn right or left, be a contrarian like Dave and
suggest a route off the beaten path.

Excerpted from Fierce Leadership: A Bold Alternative to the Worst
Best Practices of Business Today by Susan Scott 2009 Susan Scott.
Reprinted by permission of Broadway Business, an imprint of the Crown
Publishing Group. Susan Scott is the founder of Fierce Inc., a Seattle-based
leadership development company. More information about Scott and her books is
available at www.fierceinc.com.