5 Ways to Create a Blameless and Collaborative Work Environment
Imagine the pressure of a top technology job at Dow Jones, The Wall Street Journal, or a fast-growing cloud service platform for over 75,000 retailers in 60 countries. Quality, speed, and innovation are critical. Now imagine the feeling when something goes wrong in those jobs: a missed deadline, a quality issue, upset subscribers. The reputational, security, and financial stakes are high. How would you respond to mistakes, misses, and failures in that environment?
Having Humility Even Under Pressure
That has been the career of Jamie Thingelstad, now SVP and Chief Technology Officer at SPS Commerce. His background is impressive, but as those who work with him will tell you, Jamie leads with a profound sense of humility amidst the pressures that come from high stakes and big demands.
In my conversations about humble leadership with Jamie and Mike Carey, another senior vice president at SPS Commerce and the company’s Chief HR Officer, one common thread seemed to run through it all: Humble leaders resist that all-too-human urge to “blame and shame,” even when the pressure is on.
As Jamie explained to me, “blameless retrospective” is a core tenet in technology, and it’s a philosophy he extends to his leadership approach as well.
5 Ways to Create a Blameless Environment
- Be a WYSIWYG (what-you-see-is-what-you-get) leader: “Life’s just easier when you’re genuine with people and genuine in your actions,” Jamie points out. People engage with you differently and give more of themselves when there are no hidden agendas. But it’s not so easy to make those personal connections when you’re leading twenty or even hundreds of people across continents. To bridge the distance, Jamie is a blogger and stays personally active on social media outlets. That way, when he reaches out, people already know something about him as a person.
- Focus on the problem, not the person: Blaming and shaming is a common kneejerk reaction to negative feedback. Instead, Jamie gets the team together and talks about what’s not going well — not who’s not doing what — and what the team can do to make things better. “He is measured and thoughtful,” Mike observes. “I’ve never seen him fly off the handle, even if something has really gone wrong.”
- Give people the freedom to shine: Jamie’s natural curiosity also keeps him from being overly judgmental. He wants feedback and new ideas, so he gives people the freedom to be themselves and do what they’re good at. Rather than trying to force-fit people into roles, he allows them gravitate towards their strengths.
- Keep your broader goals top-of-mind: One of the reasons Jamie’s so adamant about what he calls “amplifying negative feedback” through humble leadership is that he knows it’s an essential ingredient for innovation. He invites negative feedback. He makes it safe to tell him. And he never minimizes the feedback. In fact, he magnifies it to ensure he’s fully learning and responding. If people are afraid to speak up, they’re not going to take the risks that will lead to the big breakthroughs. His motto is We win; I fail.
- Be fuel efficient: Of course, there are many ways that leaders can invoke fear in their teams, either directly or indirectly, but as Jamie notes, you can’t lead or motivate a team — or yourself — through fear. He equates it to a sugar high. It might get you through temporarily, but it won’t fuel you over a long period. Because Jamie’s planful, Mike says, it makes him a safer person to be around.
This blameless environment feeds into the overall culture that permeates the team and the organization. While Jamie points out that you can’t manage culture, you can change the inputs and the environment so that they contribute to the culture you want to build as a leader. And the more you lead from the front by being there, being part of the work and staying fully engaged in it, the more everyone will give — for the good of everyone involved.
Check out highlights of my interview with Jamie here.
Comments are closed here.