Pause — 3 Reasons to Slow Down to Speed Up
How taking time to momentarily stop can boost employee morale and delivery
The business world is whirring at 100mph and every minute of the working day counts. Failure to spend these moments wisely can see deadlines being missed, stakeholders becoming disgruntled and in worst-case scenarios, businesses going under. It’s survival of the fittest and with these elements of fear at play, it’s understandable to see why people resort to “just get stuff done” mode. However productive this approach may be perceived, leaders shouldn’t underestimate the power of a well-timed pause…
Pause…to invite time to think
In Graham Allcott’s best-selling book, How to be a Productivity Ninja, he describes the two mindsets that are at play when someone approaches their working day; to either be in boss-mode or worker-mode.
Boss-mode sees you using your mental acuity to take stock of the job at hand by:
- Assessing
- Planning
- Designing
- Facilitating
Meanwhile, worker-mode is there to get things “done”. Depending upon the line of business you’re in, this could be:
- Building
- Coding
- Baking
- Sculpting
People should optimise their flow of work by alternating between worker-mode and boss-mode throughout the day
In true Taylorism fashion, assumptions are often made when it comes to who should be conducting the boss-mode work and who should be kept in worker-mode for the duration of their day. Hence, it is perceived that anyone with “Manager”, “Lead” or “Chief” within their job title should remain in boss-mode, “doing the thinking”, whilst the masses should be kept busy “doing the doing” in worker-mode. Fortunately, the world is getting wise to the faults in this mindset. As Allcott explains, regardless of job title, people should optimise their flow of work by alternating between worker-mode and boss-mode throughout the day. Unfortunately, with these oppressing job titles in the mix, society still leads workers to believe that they are not paid to think — it is a duty that belongs solely to their superiors.
“But we’ve got this far with our clear segregation of duties. What’s the risk of not permitting our workforce to think now?”. I would counter that question with, “Why would you want only one person in your organisation doing all the thinking if you could benefit from a wealth of great minds working together?”.
As leaders, it is our duty to invite our workers to pause and think. We must break down this dated stigma — we are no longer in the Industrial Revolution and we value autonomy over subjugation.
Pause…to reassess the plan
Take a moment to consider how often pauses are used by people in everyday life to help them decide whether or not they should choose to pivot or persevere with the current plan.
Off the top of my head, here’s three:
- “[Person one’s name], do you take [Person two’s name] to be your wedded partner, to live together in marriage? Do you promise to love them, comfort them, honor and keep them for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and health, and forsaking all others, be faithful only to them, for as long as you both shall live?” — PAUSE — “I do”
- Half-time during a football match
- Signing the contract for a job offer
Whether it be the football manager that decided to use the 4–4–2 formation that ultimately lead the team to be 3–0 down at half time or two people organising their wedding day, in each of these situations a plan lead people to a particular pivotal moment in time. Likewise, in each of these scenarios people are given a chance to stop and ask, “Is this plan that got me here still the right plan going forward?”.
Plans by their very nature have a shelf life. They are created at the very point in time when the least information is known
In the case of the football manager, they’ve probably come to the realisation that the plan needs to change — 4–4–2 is costing them the game and they must pivot the team’s approach to claw back the victory. For our loved-up couple that are destined to be newlyweds, persevering with the plan is their mutual decision.
Plans by their very nature have a shelf life. They are created at the very point in time when the least information is known about the future and therefore should constantly be reassessed. It’s with this reason in mind why the likes of Agile delivery is often favored over Waterfall. A Waterfall approach makes the assumption that the plan created on Day 1 is still going to be relevant on Day 100 of the project — no nuances will arise and everyone was 100% clear as to what they wanted from the get-go. Agile delivery addresses the fact that as human beings, despite us wanting something on Day 1, we more often than not don’t know what that want was until we’ve got it presented before us, and it most likely doesn’t reflect our Day 1 vision.
Scrum, probably the most widely known Agile practice, introduces specific pauses in the guise of “Scrum ceremonies” throughout each iterative cycle to give the Team chance to reassess the plan. The Scrum Team start the iteration collaboratively constructing a plan. As mentioned however, as this is Day 1, the Team are creating this plan when they are at their most vulnerable. At this stage, they have less knowledge of the requirements than they will by the end of the iteration and yet, they know they need to plan to provide a combined sense of direction. On a daily basis, the Team will meet and discuss how they are progressing in accordance with their plan. All being well, the plan is on track but quite often or not, the Team are gaining a deeper understanding of the problem they are setting out to solve and can disprove the plan’s trajectory. The question is, do you provide a working environment that nurtures a culture where teams feel safe enough to question the validity of the plan?
As leaders, we should encourage our employees to take deliberate pauses. Time to stop running at 100mph, reassess the plan and question whether or not it’s still the most efficient means of which to achieve the desired outcome. By permissing them to take a moment to evaluate the situation, we can expect to see workforces become a body of “thinkers”, not just mindless “doers”. If the plan that was forged 3 months ago is no longer relevant or achievable, we want our staff to feel safe in raising the alarm now rather than fear that making their voice heard is an act of mutiny.
Pause…to celebrate progress
It’s the end of the project and it’s finally been delivered. As with every other project you’ve been part of, it wasn’t without its pitfalls:
- A team member fell ill and was out of work for a month
- 5 weeks into the project, your primary stakeholder decided to do a U-turn on how they wanted Widget X to function
- Upon missing an intermediary milestone, a Senior Manager dragged you and your team into a room to give everyone a motivating talking to
- A team member handed their notice in, leaving part-way through the project
Despite the team trying their best to overcome the odds, due to these hiccups, the project either came in late, over budget or the scope needed to be minimised. In light of this, it is far too common for businesses to bring a project to a close by:
- Holding a retrospective root cause analysis, finding out why the project didn’t go to plan
- Moving the team straight onto their next project
These are two very valid actions that need to happen. Without them, the same issues that plagued the last project could happen again and the next project needs to begin before it loses relevance within the market. That said, knowing the effort your team has put into the project, giving a well-timed pause precedence over the aforementioned actions may be all it takes to infuse your team with some much-needed energy.
Don’t get me wrong — this is not to be confused with empty, meaningless praise. People will see straight through it! However, providing sincere feedback in light of a team member’s actions can elicit some invaluable inertia. Over the years, many studies have been conducted analysing not only the impact of praise on people, but also the language used whilst providing the praise. One such notable expert in this field is Carol Dweck. As summarised in this article, Dweck studied the impact of praising a child’s efforts over praising them for their intelligence. Two groups of children were asked to complete the same task. Upon completing the task, the children in Group 1 were praised for the effort they put into the task. This may have sounded something like, “I can see the task was very challenging but you did a brilliant job of sticking with it and seeing it through to the end”. Meanwhile Group 2 were praised for the intelligence they used to complete the task. Yet again, something like, “You are so clever! You made completing the task look so easy.” Upon being given a second task, the children in Group 1 (that were given praise about their efforts), outperformed the children in Group 2. By positively reinforcing the behaviour of perseverance, Group 1 felt that no matter how difficult the problem they were faced with, they’d be congratulated for their efforts. On the other hand, Group 2, feeling like they were gifted with the ability to naturally achieve due to their own intelligence became complacent and apathetic towards the second task.
Unless you are Fagin from the Charles Dickens novel Oliver Twist, it is unlikely that you are leading a workforce of children. It is not to say, however, that this experiment is any less relevant to you leading a group of adults.
As leaders, we are to learn how to address our teams to ensure they remain engaged and their efforts appreciated. Find moments to pause and help your teams reflect upon the journey they’ve come on to achieve what they have today. Think about the language you use — reinforcing their efforts in the face of adversity.
A pause may seem like a deviation from “getting stuff done”, but timed well, it will give everyone a moment to collect their thoughts, realign the plan and propel the team forward throughout future ventures.