Why managers must balance openness and discretion

Managers sit at the crux of organisational transparency and discretion. They need their employees and organisations to share information with them and are regularly deciding what to pass on and what to keep confidential. It's a tough balance. People need the right information to feel secure and do their job, but too much information can be overwhelming.

Context and alignment are essential. Ideally managers want a match between their own desired level of transparency and their company's overall appetite for openness. Having these out of sync can be a recipe for disaster.

This episode is packed with anecdotes from our hosts on the good, bad and ugly of transparency in management.

00:30 mins The values of transparency within an organisation influence how we operate in terms of our openness and discretion. And managers especially need to be aware of, and stay in sync with, those organisational norms and expectations.

2:30 Openness and honesty are important elements of trust. But discretion is also an important part of the manager's toolkit. Tim shares an example of how his application of discretion changed during his time as a manager.

4:40 It's important to be explicit about confidentiality. Both the person disclosing and the person receiving information should be aware of whether they want something kept confidential, and whether it can be kept that way. Observing confidentiality is a key part of the psychological contract between employee and manager. Managers should ensure their behaviour is clear and consistent so that their employees feel secure when disclosing information to them.

7:50 It can get tricky when deciding how much of our personal opinions we should share. For example, if we disagree with an organisational decision, is it right to share that with our team? As always, it depends.

9:00 In her book Powerful, Patty McCord said "People can hear almost anything if it's true". In this quote she was primarily referring to feedback, but she built a notably open culture at Netflix.

9:50 If people think we are hiding more information than we need to, it creates a culture of secrecy. This lack of openness can lead to "How could this have happened here?" type scandals.

10:30 Tim talks about a recent time he chose not to share important context with an employee. Pilar points out that our desire to protect our employees from suffering will sometimes cause them greater suffering.

12:50 One of the big problems with withholding information is that people's imagination will almost always create a scenario that is worse than the reality. For example when Pilar didn't get feedback from a manager she created her own narrative.

15:00 Too much transparency from a manager can overwhelm employees. One of Tim's friends was very transparent when considering selling his company. But he regretted doing this because ultimately it wasn't their decision. Tim took the opposite pathway and still feels conflicted about it.

17:50 Some good questions to ask yourself before sharing something: "How does it help them? Does this give them more agency?".

18:45 Tim has previously over-shared with employees about issues he was having with his peers. Which didn't help the employees and damaged company culture.

20:00 Even in a transparent culture we still want safety.

21:20 Transparency has to be a two way street. Our organisation and managers need to demonstrate the same level of transparency that they ask of their employees.

23:00 Our hosts break the fourth wall.

What about you, dear listener? What is some of your good, bad and ugly with regards to transparency? We'd love to hear from you! Get in touch through our Contact Form https://managementcafepodcast.com/contact/