Being real without being rude

When expectations are not met, great leaders do not withhold constructive criticism. They provide people with the feedback they need to make necessary adjustments. But, they do this in a thoughtful way. They’re real without being rude.

As I’ve worked on improving my leadership abilities over the last few years, I’ve avoided being too negative about people’s performance. My goal was to avoid reducing trust, which is critical to long-term relationship success. In hindsight, this was an overcorrection. I prioritized being kind over being real when I could have been both.

People don’t interpret realness as rudeness when they believe you have good intentions. The trick is to attack the situation and not the person. You want to fix the bad situation without insulting the good person.

Validate the person before you hit them with realness. It’s kind of like being positive before you’re negative, but there’s nuance. The goal of the validation step is to help the other person understand there’s nothing wrong with themself the person so that they can be open to facing the reality of the situation, which you don’t agree with.

Trust is a factor. When you have sufficient trust built up, people are more likely to assume the best. When you have a minimal trust established, people are more likely to assume the worst. But no matter how much trust you have, being real in a rude way risks eroding it.

It’s time for me to practice being real without being rude.

Notes:

[1] Hat tip to Tyler King who helped me think through this concept at the end of the April 1, 2022 episode of Startup to Last.

Have thoughts on this topic? I'd love to hear from you! I'm @RickLindquist on Twitter.