Using Hope (Theory) to empower team members
When I'm speaking to leaders about what they would like from their team, one of the common challenges is that team members do not show the level of initiative that their leaders would like. From the leaders' perspective, I often hear questions like "why don't they just [INSERT LEADER'S DESIRED ACTION HERE]"?
From the leader's perspective, it feels like team members are waiting for permission or instruction before they take action. Interestingly, the other side of the same coin could be seen as team members not feeling empowered to take actions - a common challenge raised within teams.
From whichever side of the coin that you look at it, the idea that team members are willing and able to show initiative and take proactive steps is a source of friction.
So, what has hope got to do with it? Back in '97 a mate of mine in Year 12 said to me "Hope is a defeat mechanism". He was in the Airforce Cadets, so maybe it was influenced by a military approach to battle. I agree if we're talking about false hope. There's no point being delusional!
What I am talking about today is real hope as the word is used in Hope Theory (developed by Charles Snyder). In this context, hope is defined as the perceived ability to produce pathways to achieve desired goals and to motivate oneself to use those pathways.
Sounds a bit academic, so let's think about hope as requiring:
Goals – Something meaningful to achieve
Pathways – Different ways to achieve our goals.
Agency – The belief that we can take the actions to achieve these goals.
All of these are interrelated. The more well crafted and personally meaningful the goal, the more likely that we are to explore and identify possible pathways. The more pathways that we can identify, the more confident that we will be that we can use one of them (or a combination) to get to our goal. Agency is essential for team members to show initiative and be proactive.
If we think about this through a team lens, we might be able to see some common ways in which we are unintentionally diluting (or even squashing) the hope within our teams. Humans are pretty savvy and excellent at conserving energy. If we don't believe that something can or should be done, there is very little chance it's going to happen. We can do this when goals are imposed upon our team with little or no effort made to connect them with what team members care about. We can do it when we tell our team member how to do a task and not what needs to be done. We can do this when we insist on being copied in on every email or a part of every meeting.
We don't do it intentionally, but we can easily remove hope and discourage our team members. Real hope energises us and keeps us going - even in the face of a few setbacks. It can help team members feel like they know what the right thing to do is and that they are able to take those actions.
Some questions for you to consider this week about supporting hope for your team members:
Goals - are your team's goals meaningful to them individually and collectively?
Pathways - are multiple ways of achieving goals promoted, encouraged and explored?
Agency - do team members believe that they are capable of taking the right actions?