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Arguably the scariest leadership components would be that of confrontation. Thousands of leaders allow problems to develop without addressing them. And because of this, the problem is given freedom to expand and grow to the point where the problem becomes ungovernable. You now have a massive problem to deal with when it could have been solved a lot earlier in the process with a bit of confrontation. Healthy confrontation is a term I use to describe confrontation done in a well mannered, respectful way. A lot of people might think of confrontation as shouting and screaming, but it is far from that. Confrontation means I am willing to confront you. It means that I am fine with stepping out and working through all of the frightening and difficult relational issues. A great definition for healthy confrontation is: "To place strategic pressure that helps us expose where we need to grow and change." The goal of confrontation is never that I exert all of my authority on you. It should never happen like this. When somebody wins in the confrontation and another person loses, you have lost sight of what healthy confrontation is. There should always be a win/win result at the end of your confrontation. A good way to make sure you both win in the confrontation is by asking questions. Asking questions is an under rated weapon in your hand. You see, when questions are asked, and accusations aren't thrown, you keep the person you are in confrontation with powerful. They stir the person's thinking to the point that, hopefully that would find ownership of the problem they created. Confrontation will evidently happen when you have two strong personalities coming together on your team. Many teams operate in an atmosphere where no one is wanting the truth from team members. These teams feel very unsafe share their feelings, because a safe environment has not been established, because there is no trust, because the truth is not valued or welcomed. These teams function in an environment where it is your job to survive the most powerful person in the organization, and you do this by telling that person what they think they want to hear. It is essential for your team to realize that you value them expressing the truth and their true feelings. Likewise, the team needs to be aware that you will confront them when they need to be confronted, but also that the team can confront you when they feel it is necessary. Any successful confrontation that maintains the value for relationship throughout the confrontation will develop trust, deeper connections, and confidence within the team. Practically speaking: In order to see team growth, here are some practical steps: First off, assessment and feedback are very important. A person who commits a foul will continue to repeat the same pattern unless somebody lets them know how their poor decisions or behavior are affecting everyone else. By presenting feedback to this person, you are giving them the opportunity to change. Which means they have the power to make the decision to take that change or not. Which makes them a powerful person. Giving feedback would look like you saying: "This is how your decision to do this affected me. This is how your temperament made me feel. This is how your actions or choices are making me feel." The next thing to do is ask a lot of questions. You can never ask too many questions. These questions help you gain insight into the person's thought process when they made their mistake. This is something a lot of leaders overlook. This also takes out a lof of the sting in the confrontation. Instead fo the person feeling like you are assaulting them, you are making them a powerful person by allowing them to discover the reasoning behind the decision they made, together. By asking things like, "When you did this thing (whatever it was), what was going through your mind at that time?", you are gaining the confidence of your team members because you are listening to what they have to say and are giving them help in understanding some fo the poor decisions they made. The last one is to make sure that you see the person as the most valuable thing. For some leaders, this is something new to you. But you want to make sure that you never make the person feel like you value the issue more than you value them. You are still going to make sure you come to an outcome with the issue, but that is not your priority. Your priority is to maintain relationship through the confrontation. And through this, trust is built into the team. If you would like more team building ideas, visit Team Building Ideas HQ
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