I clearly remember reading Joe Tori’s book about Derek Jeter. At some point, they were nervous to go to Jeter and tell him that defensively, he wasn’t very good going to, I think it was his right side, or maybe it was to one side. They put it off. They put off. Finally, the GM, Cashman, says, All right, we got to do this. He has dinner with Jeter. When he tells Jeter, Jeter’s angry, not that they didn’t tell him, but that they waited so long to tell him so that he knew what direction he could get better at, where he needed to improve. It exactly ties in with what you’re saying right now is the delay of the honesty keeps us from achieving the results that we’re capable of.
Josh, I didn’t read the book, but I am a Yankee fan because I live in New York. Do you remember what their reasoning was for avoiding the conversation and putting it off? What did they say in the book?
They thought that Jeter would be angry and that he didn’t take… They felt he wouldn’t take criticism well. He wasn’t a guy that took well the criticism, I think was what they say. It’s been a while since I’ve read it.
No, it’s okay. But that’s typical, right? We think whatever insert negative reaction, explanation of negative reaction. Totally.
It was a negative reaction they were trying to avoid. Totally.
Let’s talk about this. This is a great example. Let’s talk about that for a second. So first of all, there could be a way that Jeter, maybe they tried to give him feedback before and he didn’t respond well to it. That’s potentially the case, right? Sure. But these things are much more nuanced than people realize. I mean, look at the irony. In the name of not upsetting him, we’re going to do something which guarantees he gets upset at us, right? So the very thing they were trying to avoid is the very thing that they got, number one. Number two, I can understand why he’s upset by not receiving the feedback, and probably for two reasons. And one’s obvious and one’s maybe less obvious. The obvious one is, I’m a high performing guy. I want to perform at my best. So if there’s something that I’m doing, which is preventing me from doing that, it’s like, I need to know that. The reason I was able to get to this high-level position is because I’m an incredible learner and a high performer. So that’s the first thing. So you’ve deprived me. So I’ve had this time period where I could have been a lot better than I was, and you stole that from me.
But the other thing is the implicit… Now we’re warming up. I didn’t need a Jeter story. Is the implicit insult, Josh, because what are they implicitly saying about him by not giving him the feedback?
That he’s not a big enough man to take it.
Exactly. So he’s soft and weak, right? So it’s like, you’re so fragile that if we give you some feedback that you can’t go to your right, you’re going to crumble like a little baby. And it’s disrespectful in that way. Now, I don’t think they’re intending to be disrespectful, but by any means. But this is the thing. Dude, I’ve got over 30,000 instances just like the Jeter story that we look at and through all the training and coaching that we’ve done. But this is what’s happening every single day inside of companies. People have reasons that you and I would both be sympathetic with, but why they’re not having the conversation. But if not always, almost always, the cost of not having the conversation exceeds by a mile the cost of having the way that people… What I’m trying to do, and the way that people… And what I’m trying to say is, if you can learn how to do it well, you won’t have to avoid it so much.
