The Secret to Expectation Management

An old saying advises that an expectation is a resentment waiting to happen.  Resentments corrode the vessel that contains them.  That’s why holding on to resentments creates so much collateral damage including heartburn and anger.  Let go and rethink it.

 A Future that Hasn’t Happened

What is an expectation exactly? It is a hope, an optimistic state of mind that some future event will be what we want. Hope, by the way, is not a strategy, or a leadership competence.

 Hope is neither necessarily good or bad.  Hope can be positive – I hope dinner will be tasty. I hope the Bears will do well in the playoffs. Either way no big deal.  If dinner doesn’t suit, I’ve got peanut butter and jelly.  If the Bears lose, oh well – it’s “da Bears…”

 It is okay to hope? I applaud optimism and embrace realism.  So, how does an optimistic realist deal with a desire to hope, without falling into a pit of despair.

 Brewing Trouble

Expectations might get us into trouble when the stakes are significant.  If dinner is important because I’m cooking for a special occasion, I take steps to insure a positive result.  I start with a recipe from a chef I trust [Marcella Hazan]. I purchase fresh, quality ingredients, I allow the necessary time. And I think it through and so on.

 Where expectations stir up trouble is when the outcome is important, but we don’t do the legwork.  We don’t take time.  A manager asks one of his reports to do a report on XYX.  The individual delivers what he heard being asked for. When the manager sees it, he is angry.  It’s not what he expected. But it IS exactly what he asked for, delivered on deadline.

 The Secret

Clear requests are the secret to expectation management. When a manager makes a clear request, including preferences about important details describing, length, depth, and key metrics, [perhaps sample] for example, that’s a different story. When that happens, and when the report negotiates and confirms the request, including the what, when and how details, there is cause for hope.

 Making expectations clear with effective requests is like lighting a candle in a dark room. It sheds enough light to be confident about the next step.