As a leader and manager, I’ve often received questions from team members about things happening outside the team. What’s going on with a specific project or issue, what’s the deal with this organizational change, what have I heard about something?
I have always thought about this as Three Buckets:
- Things I have been told, and I need to make sure you know. I want that bucket to always be empty, because I have already told you everything that was in it.
- Things I don’t know, and any answer I give you will be a guess. That bucket is theoretically always full, because there’s a lot I don’t know. I’ll do my best to give a thoughtful comment, but it’s a guess. My goal is to get an accurate answer so it goes in Bucket One.
- Things I have been told, but I’m not cleared to talk about. I will never talk about those things. But, I will absolutely advocate for permission to move them to Bucket One as soon as possible.
My buckets are important to me in building trust by giving people information they need to do a better job across the board. Most organizations don’t communicate as well as they should. I’d like to improve that.
Important Exception: Sometimes I’ll receive a question about company politics or rumors. I don’t like anything like a rumor mill. I think they’re destructive. I’ve seen it happen over and over to good people. I’ve seen it happen to me. I realize they’re a natural part of working in an organization, but I have only one bucket for rumor mill items: the trash can.