Keeping the Small Promises
“If you are going to achieve excellence in big things, you must first develop the habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception; it is a prevailing attitude.”
-Gen. Colin Powell
The term, “worthy of trust” is at the heart of the relationship between leaders and their teams. Can they trust you? Are your promises good? Can your “word” be relied upon with confidence? Or does your team need to “parse your promises?”
“Well, she means well, but never shows up on time.”
“He has a lot on his mind.”
“She’s under a lot of pressure, no wonder she’s curt and cranky.”
“He never welshed on a major promise.”
“She had to break her promise on pay last year and of course the year before… but this year, we can count on her.”
Are your people saying these things about you? Do they indicate your basic intentions seem honorable, but that you can’t deliver? Do they suggest that there’s a fundamental confusion about the nature of leadership – that you don’t get it?
The fundamental medium of exchange in a corporation is “the Promise.” And that promise stems from “the Word” of the senior officer. It’s currency. Or it’s not… While much thought goes into branding and packaging, the real issues are as simple as whether the market, your customers, your employees or the people in your immediate reach can count on your assurances with confidence.
A multi-year, multi-purchase relationship between a customer and a car company turns on the small promise made by the service department about when a car will be ready for pickup. A dry cleaner can usurp a long-term relationship with a customer by delivering a few shirts without buttons. A consultant can undermine a relationship with a client by submitting an invoice with an inappropriate charge for personal expenses. A senior can ruin the relationship with the employees by showing up late and out of sorts for a meeting, explaining away the upset by saying, “it’s a small thing. I get the big stuff right don’t I?” On the contrary, in our experience all relationships turn on the “small promises.”
Think about it. If the grocer cheated you on a five-dollar purchase, wouldn’t you question all the bills? If the hotel added fifteen dollars in false phone charges, wouldn’t you start combing through receipts? If the credit card company charged you twenty dollars’ worth of un-earned interest, wouldn’t you question their ethics? If the CEO comes late to the meeting, don’t you start showing up late yourself? If the leader cheats on their spouse, but claims to be trustworthy in the office, isn’t their character and the resonance of any other promise they’ve made brought into question? “Undermining a promise” and “devaluing the currency” amount to the same thing.
In fact, there is no real difference between a promise of timeliness and the promise of accuracy in the pay package. “A promise is a promise.” We spend a lot of mental ammunition justifying our personal failures on “small” promises while asking people to respect our honesty on the big issues.
The larger truth: Life is complicated enough without having to distinguish between small promises (which are presumably, breakable), and LARGE promises (which we claim to be inviolate).
Applications
1. Personally
Take inventory of any “deflation of confidence” in your personal sphere. Resolve to make fewer promises, and to keep them.
2. Professionally
Get there. Turn off the phone. Leave your excuses at the door. Engage fully. And shave a dozen pages off every contract you originate.
3. Corporately
Turn off the “marketing magic” and get back to making simple promises. Then keep them. The promise is currency, or not.
Excellence is not an exception; it is a prevailing attitude.
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