“Be a jerk, go to work,” ~ Frank Zappa

At work we have things to do. Tasks, deadlines, things to focus on. Then things go wrong and then we are blamed for things or we blame other people for things.

Lots of … things.

In the Collaboration Equation, I say that individuals work in teams to create value. People have taken that to heart, but value ends up being the focus. People get so focused on the value that they forget about the individuals. They get so focused on completing tasks that they miss who those tasks actually exist for.

We work with and for people. Value is always a relationship.

Most of the stress in your work doesn’t come from the work itself. It comes from people asking, “Where is the thing I asked for?” or “Why did you do it that way?” And almost always, that stress exists because you’re managing the work and not the relationships.

The Quick Story Involving my Mom and Snails

My mom and I went to have dinner at a nice Italian place in Omaha. We sat at the chef’s counter where the people cooking studiously ignored us. We ordered and watched them expertly create our meals which looked very delicious. We sat there and watched them…less than a foot away from us … prepare our meals. They then went over to a serving station where they sat for FIFTEEN MINUTES. We just sat there and stared at our sauces breaking, our expertly created food cooling, pasta hardening.

The people who cooking for us were breathing the same air. Sharing the same space. But they were so focused on their part of productivity, they completely destroyed the value of the meal and us as future customers. And…they could have touched us they were so close. We were saying things like, “That sure looks like our food.” and “Excuse me, but I think our food is just sitting there.”

So, we were stakeholders. They, in their minds, had provided value. Our first visit to the restaurant was nice. This was our second, and our last. As Gordon Ramsey would say, “Such a shame, I expected more from you.”

So, your stakeholders and you, when you are a stakeholder, have expectations and when those expectations are not met…you have a dependency. The cooking team was not delivering food to the eating team when the eating team needed it.

So, to make this clear, dependencies are not a natural outgrowth of work, they are a failure state borne of crappy relationship management.

The Invisible Stakeholder Map

When Tonianne and I work with teams, we ask them a simple question: Who are all your stakeholders?

And every single time, in the first hours and days of working together, we find stakeholders they didn’t even know they had. People wearing different hats. Playing different roles in their lives.

But we all lose track of people and promises. Even me. (especially me)

We have one truth about work we need to hold onto. Your work is fundamentally about meeting stakeholder needs. And if you don’t know who your stakeholders are or, if you know but don’t take them seriously, your relationships break down. Dependencies form. Bottlenecks appear. Conversations don’t happen at the right time with the right people.

And no, you don’t get to say things like, “They’re doing it too.”

So Map Your Relationships

In practice, I have business partners, development partners, customers, team members, family members. Each plays a different role in my life. Each needs different things from me. Each needs those things on a different cadence.

My primary client? I talk to them every day.

My wife? We talk every day too, but we set aside specific time weekly to talk about finances.

My colleague Karl? He’s a stakeholder, a team member, and a development partner. So we talk daily about some things, weekly about others, monthly about others still.

And don’t you boil this down to schedule. The point here is you have to be intentional about knowing:

* Who needs what from you

* When they need it

* What role they play in your life

* What role you play in theirs

(Okay, you see how I started bolding things here because I wanted the main points to stand out… well… imagine they are all bold. Because we get this so consistently and catastrophically wrong.)

The Reciprocal Nature of Relationships

When you have a relationship with someone, it is reciprocal.

They need things from you. You need things from them. If it’s one-sided, then you’re only taking and it’s not a relationship. It’s exploitation.

Even in a client relationship where they pay you money, it’s still reciprocal. They give you money. You give them value. There’s a give-and-take.

And the reason this matters is simple: You build relationships through giving and receiving, not through demanding.

When you understand that, you’re no longer just some Transactional Task-based Tommy. You’re collaborative, you are professional, you are focused on what keeps the goal moving forward and not just the tasks checked off.

Need vs. The Asked-For Task

You should really watch the video for this part.

When you map or manage a relationship, you need to four areas of clarity:

* What do they need? Not what they asked for. What do they actually need?

* What did I promise? Be honest. What exact thing did you commit to?

* What are they worried about? This is critical. Context changes everything. If your boss is worried about whether the company will survive a market downturn, asking them about continuous improvement ROI in dollars misses the point entirely.

* What’s the context? What artifacts, links, and background information help you understand the full picture?

Why you might ask? (Though I’d hope by now you would know)… Look, when your boss asks you, “What’s the ROI on your continuous improvement project?” they’re not actually asking for a spreadsheet. They’re asking for reassurance that you’re making decisions that protect the company’s future. Even if they only know how to ask for a spreadsheet (because they aren’t managing their relationships either).

If you answer with the task you did yesterday, you will answer the question, and fail the test. Your answer will be correct, but the person you are talking to didn’t get their unstated value need yet. Then they will criticize what you did or your capabilities, because they .. again… suck at relationships as much as anybody else.

But if you answer with what you did and a quick story about how what you did helps them be less worried about whatever is keeping them awake at night, everyone wins. They now know they can count on you. They know, even just slightly, that you are paying attention to their needs. You know you’re having a meaningful conversation. You’ve completed a full value loop.

Your touch with them has been meaningful for both parties. That’s a healthy relationship.

So… think about your work. Think about your relationships. Think about what you are waiting for and what you are annoyed about and ask, “Who should I be talking to today?”

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