Several years ago, between marketing jobs, I took a much-needed detour to teach preschool and work with children with special needs. I wanted to try something drastically different and I couldn’t be more thankful for that experience. Waking up every day to play, build, teach, and laugh didn’t feel like work most of the time. It did happen to be missing some of the things I love (the kids didn’t like my spreadsheet lessons…), but it reinforced several extremely important leadership concepts for me.
Here’s what I learned:
Positive reinforcement wins
I didn’t fully appreciate the value of positive reinforcement until I spent more time working with children. Reinforcing the behavior you want rather than focusing on mistakes and wrongdoing paves the way for success. Imagine if you followed a child around and pointed out everything they did incorrectly. Of course, they’re doing things wrong! That’s how they learn–trial and error, over and over.
Adults are no different–continuously trying, learning, adapting. And adding aversive stimuli (such as criticism) has a demoralizing effect over time. That’s not to say feedback shouldn’t be provided, but it can be done collaboratively with an end goal in mind.
For example, if your employee has a certain process that is counterproductive to achieving the team goal, start the conversation by discussing the goal. First, discuss the things that are being done well and bringing the team closer to the goal. Next, have a conversation about roadblocks or challenges, “how do you think we are going to get there and what’s getting in the way?” Lastly, come up with new steps for your employee to take with their input.
A positively-framed collaborative approach will benefit everyone in the long run.
Trackable goals are 100% required
When implementing a behavior or skill acquisition goal for a child with special needs, defining the end goal (and why it’s an important goal) is the first step. And then breaking down the goal into manageable milestones is the second step. Tracking performance is next.
For example, a child’s family and care team may have a goal of teaching the child how to request items verbally to reduce the unwanted behavior of tantruming to get access to desired items. This goal would be broken down into different skills that need to be achieved to reach the broader goal (such as learning how to request the item using a gesture or picture, then learning how to say the word of the item “Legos”, then learning how to add the phrase “I want”, and so on). Progress towards each milestone is tracked rigorously so that when one is complete, the next can be started.
We should approach our team goals with the same diligence. It’s the only way to know where we want to go and whether or not we’re actually on the way. Make your goals into SMART goals, break down the steps to get there, and track your progress regularly. Your future self will thank you!
Understanding comes before change
Understanding someone’s MO or motivation for exhibiting a particular behavior is a critical factor in influencing change. When creating a behavior plan for a child, analysts will work to identify the MO responsible for the behavior and then figure out the skills needed to replace or reduce that behavior.
Most of us are not trained behavior analysts (nor should we pretend to be) so getting to the root of behavior is a stretch, but being a good listener and observer gets us much closer to understanding where someone is coming from. Ask questions. Listen for clues, objections, goals, desires, motivators.
Approaching things from a place of compassion and truly wanting to understand someone’s point of view will help you lead more effectively. Hear them out. Learn what they care about. A great discovery question to ask a team member is “What makes you say, ‘______made today a good day or _____ made me feel good about work’.” Questions like that will help you get to the bottom of what drives their job satisfaction and sense of worth in their role. And that information will help you motivate and excite.
Fun works at all ages
Children learn more when they’re having fun and staying engaged. A classic trick is turning something into a song to make it more fun to learn, or singing during a non-preferred task such as cleaning up.
Adults learn more when they’re having fun and staying engaged. Now, I don’t foresee myself singing about marketing tool usage on any conference calls today, but I will reflect on how I can make things more interactive and enjoyable.
If you try to make things fun, you may have some eye-rollers, but don’t let it slow you down. Do you. Make it fun. Make it ok to laugh. After all, this is where we spend the most time and we should enjoy ourselves once in a while.