Sharpen Your Carrots

Leaders must strike the right balance by providing optimism and realism.  This extends to how they treat their employees.  There has to be a balance between praise and corrective feedback.   In parenting I refer to this as providing some tough love.  The love is there, but there has to be discipline and the ability to clearly say no.  As an executive coach, I often engage in conversations with clients about how they are driving results with their direct reports.  Are they providing the right level of accountability?

This balance of praise and punishment is rooted (pun intended) in the concept of the carrot and the stick. The concept of the "carrot and stick" approach to motivation can be traced back to the early days of animal husbandry. Farmers would motivate their animals to move forward by dangling a carrot in front of them (the reward or "carrot"), while simultaneously using a stick to prod them from behind (the punishment or "stick") if they tried to stray off course or became stubborn.

Over time, the concept of using a combination of rewards and punishments to motivate behavior was applied to other areas, including education, management, and politics. The phrase "carrot and stick" became widely used to describe this approach to motivation, with the carrot representing positive reinforcement and the stick representing negative reinforcement.

In a recent coaching conversation with a CEO, we talked about this topic and the individuals optimistic approach that results in providing more praise than punishment with their direct reports.  My advice to them was to sharpen their carrots.  He liked the metaphor.  The carrot and the stick can actually be the same instrument.  Fictitiously you can hit or poke someone with the carrot as well as praise them with it.  A sharper carrot is about making the point and providing the candid corrective feedback that employees need.

A question I often ask is,

“As a leader would you rather be liked or respected?” 

The typical answer is respected, but the actions many leaders take lean more towards the desire for likeability.  Having tough conversations and providing candid feedback can be uncomfortable, but it is a learnable skill and one that the best leaders do well.  I am a firm believer in the accountability equation where the say to do ratio must equal one.  In my experience, the best leaders hold themselves and their teams to the same high standards.  Where this falls apart is when a leader holds themselves to a higher standard than they do for the rest of the team.

If carrots are good for ones vision, then leaders should eat more carrots so they can articulate vision and direction. At the same time striking the right balance between praise and driving accountability must be maintained. It might be time to sharpen your carrots and reassess your balance between praise and consequences.