So, let's kick off, if we could, just to give you some ideas, our topic today is managing as a new dermatologist, and really we wanted to focus very strongly today on dealing with some of those difficult conversations, and some of the challenges in having difficult conversations, and why it's so important to have them early, and a lot of people tend to avoid them, and that's just reality, because no one wakes up in the morning saying, yay, I have to have a tough conversation today, really enjoys it, come on, and we're dealing with people who are intelligent, there's no shortage of intellect here, so you've got a whole pile of people going, why do I have to tell people that, these people should know it, what do you mean I've got to say, wash your hands, what do you mean I've got to share stuff with them, you know, I was working in Richmond, Virginia the other day at one of the universities, and I did two sessions there, Ott Savio, maybe some of you guys know him, Dr Savio, and he asked me to come in and work, he's the head, the chair of actually the entire medical school, and I worked with the folks, and it was just amazing the number of people who said, we've never really thought about having these conversations, and we have to have them, and we're not 100% sure how to have them, but here's the irony, those of you who deal with patients, you have difficult conversations every single day of your life, every single day of your life with your patients, and you'll see there's a great deal of similarity as to what we're going to talk about today, so lots to cover, what are we going to talk about during the course of this meeting, couple of things I'd like to share, number one, why is it so important to have them early, I hope you can read this okay, is that clear, can people see that, I just want to make sure you can read that, okay, why is it so important that we have this conversation early, I do want to spend some time talking about the ability to diagnose, and that's why I love working in the medical fraternity, because you folks would never prescribe until you've diagnosed, and it's exactly the same when dealing with people who are struggling with behavioural performance, we have to diagnose why are they doing this, is it an attitude thing, is it a skill thing, is it they just don't care, is it they're tired and they're overloaded, or do they just think they're above the rules, I'm the best phlebotomist, I'm the best RN, I'm the best lab assistant, I can do whatever I like, I've been here for 327 years, now I understand in some cases your hands are tired, I get that, right, I get it, but I want to share with you methodologies and techniques, so once we've done the diagnosing, then I want to spend a little bit of time in what's the actual process, how do we have the different conversations once you've done your respective diagnosis, and that's a key, key, key skill, so let's spend a couple of minutes, I'm going to get you folks into a group exercise immediately, what I'm asking you to do is once you're in your teams, very briefly introduce yourself to each other, and then I would like you to talk about two things, number one, why is it so important to have conversations early, why is it so important, why is it absolutely vital that we address this and nip it in the bud early, so let me just have a look here, and then why is it so important to have difficult conversations early, and what are the ramifications of not? All right, folks, as I said, I'm always a little, a little nervous when we've got to go a little quickly, and I put you into groups, and I ask you to do five minutes, because it flies when you get chatting, and I understand that, but it's the opportunity to just share some ideas, and we've had, Alex has just joined us, so welcome to you, Alex, thanks for joining us, so I'd love to get a little bit of feedback from you folks, just whoever, there were three different groups, whoever would like to volunteer, just perhaps a little synopsis, you don't have to tell me who was in your team, but just a little bit of feedback about why is it so important we have these conversations early, who would like to kick off, please don't be shy, come on, jump on, don't be shy. Our group mentioned setting expectations with supervising PAs and NPs, if you are not designated in that, as well as office management issues, and then setting expectations with MAs. Yeah, Sarah, that's a great comment, and a lot of people often say, well, why do I have to set standards, they should know, well, the reality is, you have to set them, and you have to keep talking about them, don't assume people know stuff, they actually don't, and I don't mean that in a negative way, because they may have come from different backgrounds, different ideas, different concepts, different generations, and you have a right as a leader, which you are, to say, hey, these are the rules of the game, if you want to play here, these, I'm not being draconian, I'm not being rude, I'm not being obnoxious, I'm not being full of myself, these are just the rules of the game, so we don't have chaos, and we don't compromise the integrity of our team, these are the expectations, I love that, put them on the table, let people know, and talk about them, let's keep going, thank you very much for that, who else would like to jump on, please don't be shy, guys, come on. Our group talked about just how having conversations, difficult conversations early is a sign of respect for the people that you're with, and then also just to, I think it cuts down on animosity that can build when there are those kind of unmet and unverbalized expectations, actually, I couldn't agree with you more, it's respectful, and as a leader, it's your role to point stuff out to people, and that's being assertive, and that's being kind, because what often happens, and I get this so often, and I've done this for so many years, folks, all over the world, I know that sounds arrogant, but I've worked on five continents, I've been very lucky, but it happens all over the place, I'll hear people say, well, you know, I kept doing what I was doing for seven months, and then they spoke to me, why didn't they tell me the first time it happened? And that's a sign of disrespect, I love the comment that you made, there, it's disrespectful, it's disrespectful to not have the conversation with the person to give them the opportunity to fix it, and that's why I want you folks to not be nice, I want you to be kind, I want you to be respectful, and I want you to be kind, the opportunity to fix it, and that's why I want you folks to not be nice, I want you to be kind, and there's a big difference between nice and kind, nice is I don't want to rock the boat, kind is I address the issue, because you need to know, so I use a very simple analogy, it's a stupid analogy, but I'm going to use it anyway, if I'm sitting at a restaurant, and I've got a little bit of gravy on the side of my mouth, if you're nice, you don't say anything to me, because you're worried you're going to hurt my feelings, and then I go to the restaurant, and I go, why the heck didn't anyone tell me that I had some gravy on my face, someone should have told me that, and then I'll come out, I say to people, hey guys, why didn't you tell me, they go, we didn't want to offend you, no, you offended me a lot more by not telling me, being kind would be, hey Darryl, got a bit of gravy on your face, most sane people are going to go, gee thanks, so some people don't know what they don't know, and that's why as a leader, you have to set expectations, welcome Ashley, thank you, we're just talking about the importance of having conversations early, please guys, you have to set the standards, then you have to address it, number one, Ashley, exactly what you said, we've got a couple of Ashley's here today, Ashley Patterson, Dr Ashley Patterson said, it's disrespectful, number two, people have to know, don't assume they know, number three, if you don't address issues early, they get worse, they do not get better, difficult conversations are not like red wine, they do not get better with age, all right, they do not go away, they mesastatize, to try and use a medical term, I'm just, I'm dangerous, just know enough to be dangerous, I'm your biggest nightmare, right, I've watched Dr Oz, so they get worse, they get much worse, next comment, when you don't address issues early, it tells other people they can do the same thing, and before you know where you are, you have chaos, and then my final comment, sorry, two more, the next one is, your credibility with good people will take a pounding when you don't address issues as a leader, I don't want you to answer this, but I want you to think about it, have any of you worked for a manager who never addressed issues, they just let things slide, and I'm telling you now, folks, I'll almost guarantee it, that you didn't have much respect for that person, you'd come home to your partner, your friend, your colleagues, whatever, and say, I don't know how they allow them to get away with that, my wife worked as a patient coordinator in an orthodontic practice, and she used to come home from work three days a week, and say, I don't know how he allows them to get away with that, he hated conflict, he never addressed issues, and here's my final comment, when you've got a non-performer in your team, and you don't address it, you ignore it, someone still has to get the work done, so who does the work? Either you, or you punish people for being good, I'm going to say that again, either you do it, and I hear that regularly, particularly from lesser experienced leaders, they go, you know what, I'll do it myself, it's much easier, I'll just do it myself, it's not your role, folks, and then we go, I've got my go-to person, we ignore our non-performer, I'm not saying you guys do this, this is something, these are trends that I see, we ignore our non-performer, and we punish our good people, and here's the bad news, who are the people who resign, are your good ones, your bad ones don't go, your good ones leave, your good ones walk in one day and say, I'm not doing this anymore, man, I'm exhausted, I'm doing 13 hours a day, I'm carrying this practice, I'm carrying this team, I'm carrying this academic environment on my back, why am I doing this? Your good people resign, your bad ones stay around, so you have to address it, folks, it's a key driver, so with your permission, I'd like to move on, as I am watching the clock, not for me, but for you, I know time is very important to you guys, so what we did is, we sent a little booklet with this, oh, sorry, sorry, how arrogant was that? We, I had nothing to do with it, Kerry sent you a booklet, Kerry, thank you, very short, few pages, in it, I want you to go to page number two in your books, and if you don't have the little booklet, it's fine, I'm going to put it up on the board anyway, if you have a person who's struggling with performance, I know some of you may have seen this, I get, we, every year, we get such phenomenal feedback about this little diagnostic tool, if you have got a person in your team who's struggling, as I said earlier on, at the expense of repeating myself, the first thing you have to do is identify where they fit in and why they're struggling, and you do that via your initial diagnosing conversation, hey, Kim, help me understand why these errors are taking place, Alex, help me understand why this is this, you watch the behavior for a short while, now, obviously, if you've got something egregious, if you've got racism, or sexism, or people being rude and obnoxious, that's a different story, but you observe, and I'm a huge believer in one, two, three, if it happens once, it's probably an accident, if it happens twice, it's probably a coincidence, if it happens three times, it's a pattern, and now you've got to try and determine what is that pattern, why is it happening, and that can be observation, it can be conversation, and it's generally both, having a look, why are you doing it that way, what's it, just finding out, and once you've had that observation, and the conversation, you can start putting people into categories, and I know some of you have seen this before, so people will generally struggle with behavior and performance, and I want to quickly emphasize that, we want to emphasize behavior, not only performance, too people worry, too many people worry about performance only, I was working with a group recently, not derms, right, it was a group of cardiologists, and one of the doctors said to me, I've got a person in my team, they're the best phlebotomist you've ever seen in your entire life, I don't think I can replace them, they're rude, they're obnoxious, they bark at patients, but they're the best phlebotomist I've ever had, I said, this is going to bite you in the rear end, and you know what's happened, patients have said, we're just not putting up with this nonsense anymore, this individual may not speak to us this way, you may not be rude, you may not bark at us, so you have to address behavior, and you have to address performance, and there are two criteria that will generally determine where people fit in, let's have a look at them, your vertical channel, do they have the ability or the skill to do the job, or the knowledge, have we spoken to them about our standards, have we spoke to them, if you're in private practice, have we spoken about how they interact with our patients, what are the rules of the game, how we answer the phone, how we address people as they walk in, how we show empathy, have we spoke, and obviously the technical ability as well, but it's not only the technical ability, it's also the people ability, how do they deal, how do they talk, how do they work, what do we stand for here, how do we talk to each other in our team, how do we interact with each other, so there's an ability piece, your second criteria is how willing are they to try, that's the green, and I'm hoping you can see this, I keep saying that, I know there's some light and I've got some light issues today, there we go, okay, and from this, each one of the boxes I'm going to put up here represents a problem area, let's go bottom left hand corner, we'll call that box one, I hope you have no box one people, bad attitude, bad skill, I'll say that again, box one, bad attitude, bad skill, I hope you don't have any of them, I hope they don't exist in you, welcome to you Kenneth, thank you for joining us, we've been going for 20 odd minutes, we're just talking about diagnosing if people are struggling with behavior and performance and where they fit in, it's a diagnosing tool, it's on page number two in the booklet that was sent to you, what do we have over here, bad attitude, bad skill, we call this box the selection box, now I don't want anyone walking out of here today saying Daryl Harris says we must just fire people, I did not say that for one second, all right, I did not, but if you got box one people, how exhausting are they folks, ever worked with box one people, bad attitude, bad skill, every time you ask them to do something, you get a long face, there are a million reasons why they can't do it, they give you pushback all the time, everything's always wrong, your practice is wrong, your lab's wrong, your team's wrong, nothing is ever right, the coffee is terrible, we don't get the right pens, the staples are bad, they just they can't help themselves these folks and here's the deal and they're not good at what they do either, they're actually terrible, they're not good, so they've got bad attitude and bad skill, I'm going to be very brutal on this box now, I understand that some of you are going to say Daryl, there's nothing we can do within our space, I understand that, all right, but I'm going to share with you best practice and you're going to try and find ways to move these people out, this is the box that leads to there isn't place for you in our team anymore folks and I know that sounds awful and I know a lot of people accuse me of being cold-hearted and cold-blooded, I'm not, I'm the kindest guy in the world, I will give you the shirt off my back, but box one people think differently, they take advantage, they arrive at work with a different mindset, they think differently, you folks arrive every day saying what can I give, these people arrive every day saying what can I take, it's a very different mindset, come on, I know I'm getting, I can't see you folks and I respect that, how many of you have ever worked with box one people, how exhausting are they, come on, someone unmute and talk to me, Dan, you're up, how exhausting my friend? Oh, they're absolutely exhausting, box one and then I don't know what you're going to call the one right above it, those are also exhausting too. Yeah, we'll talk about these, these are the competent jerks, we'll talk about them in a minute, but thank you for jumping on and Tasneem, thank you, I see you jumped on as well, folks, I'm pleading with you, start the process and I'm going to get you working, Dan, thank you for responding, I really appreciate that, thank you very much, all right, start the process, move them out, second point, don't transfer them internally, I see so many organizations do that, it's rearranging the deck chests on the Titanic, please don't do it, we move them, you know, I had a colleague of yours the other day and I hope I'm not speaking out of turn, it was a dermatologist and they said, you know, Daryl, I've just had an epiphany, they said, if we're dealing with a patient and we find a malignant carcinoma on the shoulder, we try as hard as we can to remove it, we remove the whole thing, I'm talking in layperson's terms here, okay, because we want it out, we want to get rid of it, if we transfer people in box one, it's like taking the carcinoma from the shoulder and putting it on the leg, and I went, wow, that's an interesting analogy, I had never considered that, there was one of your colleagues who said that to me one day, all right, box one, start the process, let's go to box two, box two, nicest people in the world, great attitudes, here's the mistake we make, we confuse attitude with aptitude, and because they've got some nice attitudes, we assume they know how to do the job, this is your coaching box, should be a fun conversation, this should be an energetic conversation, people should be saying thank you to you, this should be cool, let's go to box three, going to be very controversial on box three, these are people with great attitude, great skill, they were your rock stars, and you slowly start seeing them going backwards, they lose that mojo, they lose that spring in their step, they lose their energy, that's still okay, but they've gone from A plus students to B, A plus players to B's, that's still okay, but you just see the mojos going, that's something happening, boredom, frustration, too much to do, overloaded, lack of prioritizing, box threes, we call this box the environment, and I get controversial here, because I'm pleading with you as leaders, do what you can to change the environment, and I get a lot of pushback for this, a lot of people are going to say, but Daryl, I have to treat everyone the same way, you don't, as a great leader, you don't, now I understand you have rules, and I understand you have policies, but sometimes I'm pleading with you, use the policy as a guideline, sometimes policies get in the way of good decision making, now I'm not saying create revolution, I didn't say get pitchforks and storm the Bastille, I did not say that, but if you've got a rock star in your team, and there's a silly policy standing in the way, go and fight for them, go and bat for them, see if you can change that environment, and then as Dan correctly said, box four, these are individuals, they've got the ability, but they're complete knuckleheads, they're rude, they're obnoxious, they've been made into sacred cows, they yell at people, they think they could do what they like, they think they can get away with absolute murder, that's our box four, and that is a counselling conversation, so I'm going to get you guys into another group exercise, we've got people coming and going and on and off, it's a little crazy, but anyway, so be it, I want you to get in your tubes and I want you to discuss how have you and how do you start and deal with box one and box threes, and we can have a little bit of a feedback session after that, I'm going to give you a few minutes to do that, how do we handle our ones and how do we handle our threes, and I'd love there to be a bit of a conversation, so I'm going to give you about four minutes to do that, please nominate someone to give feedback. How do we handle ones? How do we handle fours? What can we, apologies, start again. How do we handle ones? How do we handle threes? How do we handle our ones? How do we handle our threes? And threes, I want you to be a little controversial. Don't be scared. You should be getting an invitation right now. Dan, I'll come back to your question now, and then how do we handle our box one people? Bad attitude, bad skill, our environment people, good people are going backwards. This is our coaching box, and that's where we are now. So we're just having a conversation. Folks, I was just trying to give a little brief to someone. So I got a chat comment that came in from Dan, and the comment was, how can I manage someone out of the organization when I don't have the authority? So I'm going to give you an opinion here, Dan. You've got to determine how you can use it. It cannot be about you and the person. So let's say, hypothetically, Daryl works in a team with you, equal footing, or you're not my boss. And Daryl is truly compromising the integrity of the team, all right? Whatever that integrity might be, late, slovenly, bad, bad attitude, whatever it might be, the way you have to handle it is you've got to escalate it upwards. But it cannot be about Dan and Daryl. It has to be how Daryl is compromising the team and compromising the leader of the team. So hypothetically, Kerry is the senior fellow, senior surgeon, senior partner. Just work with me for a minute. Dan, you are a physician, and I'm a PA. But I don't report to you. And Daryl, the PA, is really messing up on an ongoing basis. You've got to be going to Kerry. So Kerry, this is not about Daryl and Dan, all right? However, it's vitally important to understand the current situation is Daryl is compromising the integrity of this practice. The implications are Daryl will hurt this practice ultimately. You need to address it. And that's about the best you can do. But it cannot be about you and the individual on equal footing, because the senior person who doesn't have the courage to have the conversation will say, oh, you two just have got an emotional issue. They will push it aside. They will deflect it. So you've got to create some pain for that senior person for them to identify how the performance of someone else is actually hurting the greater team, affecting the strategy, compromising donors, compromising our patients, affecting our credibility. That's about the most effective way I can share with you. Does it always work? Absolutely not. But you have to – people change for two reasons. They either see the pain, either see the light, or they have to feel some pain. These people who don't want to act on it generally don't see the light. So you've got to create some pain for them. And that really – you have to manage that one upwards. But it can't be about Dan and Daryl. It's got to be about how Daryl is hurting the team. And it's not – you're not – and it's got to be fact-based. It can't be emotion. It's got to be Daryl's behavior today was. Daryl's missed five deadlines. Daryl's mixed up different bloods in different things. I'm making up stuff as I go along here. It's got to be fact-based. That's the best I can give you, Dan, unless anyone else wants to chip in. Okay, anyone else want to give us some feedback? How do we handle our ones? Come on, talk to me. I can share what I agree. So, in summary, definitely have to address the issue. One suggestion that came out of it was like compliment sandwich trying to say like you did this good, then are like this. We've seen you do this well, and then sort of address what the issue is at hand. But I think all of us agree that can go both ways. It can be positive response and it can also be negative and like the person who you're giving the feedback to can just disagree with you. So we had a little bit of challenge. Lauren, I'm going to be a little controversial on this one. If we're really dealing with box one people, I wouldn't do the compliment sandwich. And because you might confuse the individual. I'm very comfortable to do the compliment sandwich on a two. But on a one, this is a person with bad attitude and bad skill. You've got to just get straight to point. Look, the reality of the situation, you've arrived seven times late, seven times in a row, you've made 14 errors, we've coached you, we've trained you, we're seeing no change. I know that sounds very hard and it sounds very brutal, but you actually have to be quite direct with this one. And it's still respectful, because the ultimate situation is this person has to understand this is a big deal. And I'm a little nervous when we do the sandwich, because the person walks out hearing that they're quite good. And in the box one situation, they're actually not. If it's a true box one, they've got bad attitude, bad skill, your overriding objective is to work them out. So I'd ask you to be a little cautious on box one about the compliment sandwich. And I'm repeating myself. Box two, I'm very comfortable. And we'll talk about that in a minute. I'll give you a methodology. But box one, I want you to be to the point. Sit down with human resources. Tell them you've got a box one people share this diagnostic tool with you. Bad attitude, bad skill. And here's the bad news, folks. If you're in leadership roles, it's about documenting, documenting, documenting, documenting. It's a pain in the butt. And I see Kim having a big nod of her head there. Here's the problem. If you don't document, document, document, document, and it goes to litigation, you are screwed. I hope I'm allowed to say that. I'm a very direct guy. I love you, folks, and I respect you. But the reality is, you've got to start the process. You've got to turn the heat up. You've got to put them on a pip. You've got to work in conjunction with HR. You've got to make sure that the upper higher ups support you. Go and talk to them. Hey, listen, I've got a box one person. I'm starting a performance improvement program with them, and it could lead to termination. Are you going to support me? Because all you need is the dean of the faculty. You need the head. You need the chair or something to say, no, you're not getting rid of that person, and you're done. Then you've got to go back to what Dan said and do the other way around. Start the conversation, document it. Let's go to our box threes, if you don't mind. Guys, by the way, none of these always work. You could work in an environment where people are going to go, we're not getting rid of the person. Work around it. Awful, but it happens. Reality. I'm a realist. Let's go to our threes. Come on, what can we do with our threes? Anyone got a story to tell me about a three? Good person, good skill, good attitude. You start seeing them going a little backwards. Sometimes you've got to just, I've got to be careful how I say this, sometimes you've got to break a rule or two. Sometimes you've just got to have some courage and go, you know what, I'm going to make a plan here because I can't lose this person. And I'm being really controversial, you guys. Sure, I had a box three I can talk about. Please, Dan. Thank you for chipping in, Ben. Talk to me. I love it. Thanks. Sure. So I had a box three who's a fantastic performer on my team. About a month ago, she was starting to have a little bit of sliding backwards. I just pulled her aside and said, Hey, what's going on? Is there something going on in your personal life? And she told me a personal story and she was just having some issues at home. So I went out of my way to help solve those personal problems for her. And now she's back to being my normal type three person. Brilliant, Dan. And you know what, I appreciate that. And obviously, we never compromise the integrity of the human being. But I want to compliment you. And you probably gave her a little bit of leeway. I think you did say gender was a female. Is that correct? I don't want to make that assumption. I think I heard you say female, but let's just use they rather, or them. You gave them a little bit of leeway. You probably took a step back and said, Hey, if you need to get out of here, and I'm not saying you exactly, but if you've got to get out your 430 on the odd occasion, it's actually okay. Or something to show that you cared about these people. Because when you do that, you get them back on track. And that's really courageous leadership, Dan. Because here's the problem. A lot of people get really nervous when we look after our box number threes. You'll always get people, ah, they're the favorites. They're the prodigal son. Right? You're going to get that. I hear it all the time. Who are the people who complain the most in these boxes? Who are the people who complain the most? The numero uno's. The ones. Your threes don't complain. Your threes will be so supportive. Your threes will come to you, Dan. And they'll go, you know what? We're so glad you chatted to Molly. I'm making up a name. Okay, please. It's not Molly. We're so glad you spoke to her. You spoke to her. hope that you spoke to them, respect the fact that you gave them some time, respect the fact that you let them get back on their feet. Outstanding leadership. The people who will complain are your ones because they whine about everything. Folks, I'm pleading with you. I could share stories with you forever and I know I wanna have conversation here but I still need to cover a few little areas. Sit down with the person, listen to them and where you can change the environment. Go and bet for these people. These people make your team rock. And the people who complain the most are these puppies down here. And I don't want you to compromise your integrity but that's courageous leadership. You know, when I was in the corporate world a million years ago, I was the CEO of a publicly traded training consultancy in South Africa. I was the best rule breaker in the world. I was a complete maverick leader. I looked after my box three people like you cannot believe and I broke rules all the time and I got into trouble all the time but I only got into trouble with my top performers and I defended them to the hilt because they made the difference in our business. If I saw a sales, one of my top salespeople, top consultants and they were exhausted and they'd taken all their annual vacation for the year which in South Africa was a lot by the way and they were exhausted, I would go to them on a Thursday evening and I'd say, you're not coming in tomorrow and you're not coming in on Monday. You need some time off. Don't worry, I'll work it out next year. I'll offset it next year. Don't worry about that. Now, I'm not saying I want you to break the rules but I got them back on their feet, man and their loyalty was phenomenal. Please, get your ones out, look after your threes, have courage. It's what good leaders do and I know maybe your hands are tied but at least go and bet for them. Next, if we could please go to our box twos. I wanna quickly give you a template here as to how you run a good coaching session. So you've identified this is a person with great attitude, they are coachable but they just need to learn some skills. You definitely see them as potential and in your booklets on page three, there is an acronym which you can follow and you can use and I know you do this with your patients anyway. You basically put a treatment plan together for your patients. You're gonna put a coaching plan together for your people. So you've looked at the individual, they're coachable, they've got good attitude. This is where getting back to the comment I passed early on, I think it was Lauren, I think Lauren spoke about it, where you are going to, nice and positive, you can use the compliment sandwich here. Hey Jim, love your attitude, love your energy, love your passion and I've noticed that you're struggling on the new ABC. In order for you to achieve and reach your maximum potential you need to master ABC. It's exactly the same as a treatment plan you do with your patients. You agree on the problem or the challenge or what needs to be addressed. I'll give you an example of that and I hope I'm not saying like a hypochondriac. I got a little shock today, I'm so anemic, it's frightening and I don't know why but I'm just giving all the energy in the world and I went off and I saw a doctor and she just said, okay, we're going to put you on a treatment plan. This is what we're going to do, we're going to commit to a mutual goal then. So we agree on the problem or the challenge. Now you're going to, you'll see is you commit to a mutual goal. There has to be a finish time. This is our challenge, this is where we want you to be by a certain time. This is really important. Your T is teach and train. How are we going to get you there? What's the best way to work for you? What will work best for you? How would you like to do this? What's going to be the best? Your T. Your I is now you initiate the plan. Right, let's put this plan together, let's pull the whole thing together. Your O is now you're going to observe. Let's put our heads together occasionally, every week, how's it going? Follow up, let's do this, let's do another blood test, let's see where this thing's going. I'm trying to draw a comparison, I'm using a bit of a metaphor here. As a treatment plan, it's exactly the same thing. Let's observe, we might have changed course, we're going really well here. It's exactly what you folks do. And then your N is you negotiate a follow up, you celebrate success, and hopefully everything's good. That's how we run a good coaching session. It should be positive, it should be of benefit to the person, they should be saying thank you. Kim, the reason we're having this conversation is, notice you're struggling on ABC, in order for you to reach maximum potential, we need you to be mastering ABC by October the 7th. Bang, we agreed, and we're committing to a goal. How are we going to get you there? What's the best way you like to learn? What's going to work best for you? Cool, let's initiate a plan, let's check in and see how it's going. I'm not micromanaging, I'm just setting you up for success. And now let's celebrate success. Well done, mazel tov, congratulations. Things are good, brilliant. This should be a fun conversation. This is a template folks, that you can practice. It's a recognized best practice for coaching, should be fun, but don't leave it loosey goosey, okay? Don't be vague. And then, I know it's seven o'clock on my side, I know we started six minutes late. If you've got to jump off guys, jump off. If not, can I have five more minutes with people? Does that offend anyone? Can I move on? If anyone needs to jump off, I'm giving you permission to jump. And I'm going to hang around afterwards, if people need to ask a few questions, all right? Let's go to our box four conversation. And our box four conversation is the individual who has the ability, but they've got terrible attitudes. They fight you every day. They know alls. If it's a patient, if it's a practitioner, doctor, environment, they'll pass sarcastic comments. They think they're smart. They think it's okay to belittle patients. They pass inappropriate comments, whatever it might be, but they compromise your team. They compromise your team, but they're technically astute. And historically, this conversation is ignored. And you have to have it. And it takes courage, but you have to get support because box four can become box one quite quickly. If you've got a person who is not coming to the party, it doesn't matter how good they are, and they're compromising the integrity of who you are, you're going to be in trouble. I many, many years ago in my life let a top salesperson go in our team. They used to win salesperson of the year every single year. And I inherited this person. And I let the individual go because sadly, he had an inability to take his hands off the opposite gender. He was rude. He was a stalker. He was a bad guy. And it had been ignored. And people came to him, they said, he's scared of him in the office. I said, I had no idea he did this, but I'll watch and I'll observe. And I sat him down and I said to him, I'm warning you now, if you ever do this, and it's brought to my, I will fire you. He said, you'll never fire me in a million years. I bring too much money to the business. I said, I'll fire you in a heartbeat. In a heartbeat, I'll fire you. And he was harassing someone on a company convention at two o'clock in the morning, bashing on the door at their hotel. I wasn't there. It was a regional meeting. I was the CEO. He came into the office on Monday morning. I fired him. All right. So I'm not saying you fire these people, but you have to have this conversation. These sacred cows cannot get away with it. So page number six in your booklets. How do we have the conversation? Very similar. We don't do a compliment sandwicher. You go straight to the issue. You state the issue and why it's an issue. The person needs to understand this is serious and this is not negotiable. Boom, put them on the table. Mary, Joe, Kate, Sue, Mike, the reason we're having this conversation is this is the third time we're having it. We've seen no change. This is how it's affecting our team. Point number two, and I contradict myself here a little, allow them to state their case. Try and find out why they think it's okay. So I tend to contradict myself a little. As I said earlier on, I say, listen, listen, and listen some more. But if they start negotiating with you, you have to cut it off. This is not a negotiation and they will start negotiating with you. I'm the best nurse. I'm the best this. I'm the best that. I'm the best data processor. I'm the best lab assistant. Now, we're not trying to talk about your lab assistants. We're here to talk about the way you talk to people. You've got to cut it off really quickly, folks. And they will push back. And the most common pushback, if you want to make a note of this, is what we call the three Ds. The first D, they'll probably deny it. Have the facts. I didn't do that. Yeah, we've got four reports from four different people. Here it is, okay? They will deflect. I'm not the only person who does it. Lots of other people do it. We're not here to talk about anyone else. Don't go there. And then your third is what I call depression. And obviously we're not talking about medical depression. Now they take it personally. You hate me. You've never liked me. You've always had it in for me. You handle that exactly the way as the second one. We're here simply to talk about your current behavior, performance or lack thereof. Point number three, what are you going to do to fix it? They have to commit to changing their behavior. And that has to be documented. If they choose not to, they've now moved to box one, and you follow the box one process. They've chosen to move there. You didn't force them. They've moved there. If they say, yeah, I'll change. Thank you. I'll work with you. Let's make sure we make this thing successful. Because remember folks, I don't want to lose box for people. They have ability. They're good at what they do. They just compromise the team. This is the good sports person who's brilliant on the field, but no one wants him in the locker room. The minute they commit to, hey, I'll work with you. Thank you. Olive branch. We're not having this conversation again. I'm delighted. Let's go forward. This is in perpetuity. Follow up. Well done. Keep reinforcing the good behavior. Keep noticing the good behavior. Keep giving them feedback about the good behavior and let it go. This should not be a long conversation, but it's a very courageous conversation. But you also have to have it. So in a nutshell, folks, I've flown through this thing. All right, which I knew we would all along, Carrie. But we spoke about the need to have conversations early. We spoke about the need to set standards. We spoke about the need to diagnose. And all I've tried to show you today, and I've given you a few little tools, is number one, can you see how different the four conversations are? And you've got to make absolutely sure you get the diagnosis right. Because if I've got someone trying hard, I don't want to put them in the selection box. All right? If I've got someone trying hard, I don't want to put them in the counseling box. But if I've got someone who's not trying at all, and they know how to do it, I'm not sending them on another coaching session, because they know. They know how to do it. Now you're just wasting time and energy and money. And whatever you do, don't send this person on a training program. Some practice, oh, they're struggling. They've got too much on their plate. Let's send them on a time management course. No, no, no, no. Don't. Just listen to them. Okay? Time management course is not going to help them. Listen to them. I've got 450 things to do in a day because half the team can't do anything. Or we'll send you on time management. What a waste of time. That is just ridiculous. It just makes absolutely no sense to man or beast. And those are the four different conversations that we have to have. So guys, in an hour and six minutes, I've tried to achieve the goals that we needed to achieve.

difficult conversations

dermatologist

team dynamics

performance plan

leadership

coaching

team integrity

respectful resolution