Do You Avoid Confrontation?

Do you avoid confrontation? Confrontation is the number one thing I see holding doctors back from holding their team accountable. It’s scary and very uncomfortable and so sometimes the default is to just avoid it altogether.

As the leader, it’s your job to communicate with your team if things aren’t going the way that they should, or a team member isn’t meeting expectations.I’m going to give you a verbal skill that will help really open the door for that communication, so you’re comfortable taking action or communicating things earlier in the process. By doing this, the little things don’t become big things.

It’s very simple. You would just say something like:

“Help me understand your challenge with _____________________.” … and then fill in the blank with whatever it is that you’re not happy with and what’s not meeting expectations.

Let’s use for an example, a team member who is having challenges getting to work on time. Instead of waiting until it becomes a real issue, you can just pull that team member aside and say, “Help me understand your challenge with getting to work on time.”

That doesn’t seem as confrontational as just calling them out for being late. When you confront things head-on and you’re doing it in a way that creates a safe space for the team member to communicate with you what their challenges are, the little things aren’t going to become big things.