Today, we're going to talk about managing complicated relationships in the work context.
And particularly if you're related to someone or you're a very close friend with someone
that you work and that friendship or family relationship has complex dynamics.
We're going to talk about how using the concept of a two-hat solution really creates relational
space.
You know, we want to help each team member be professional at work even among complex
relationships.
To help this, I want to tell two stories quickly.
The first one I first heard from Dr. Henry Cloud and it's a story of a father who employs
his son.
The father owns a manufacturing company and he's walking through the factory one day when
he notices his son publicly humiliating and berating one of the older managers.
And he says, son, in my office.
Well, they get in the office and the father sits down and he says, well, in this relationship
I wear two hats.
On the one hand, I'm the CEO of this organization and on the other hat, I'm your dad.
So with my CEO hat on, I'm telling you, you're fired.
We've talked about this.
I won't have this in my culture.
We've sent you on training.
Nothing's caused any change.
So you're fired.
One moment.
Change his hat and he says, son, with my dad hat on, son, I heard you lost your job today.
Is there anything I can do?
Now there's something so wonderful about that because what it's done is it's created, took
a complex relationship and brought clarity.
There's another great story which actually just happened to me in the last few weeks.
And I was teaching this two hat solution to a team and then I got some feedback.
And it was a husband-wife team.
And the husband was the CEO of the company and the wife was reporting to him.
And then she realized that she has a wife hat and she has her work hat.
She has her executive hat on.
And so she said, well, after you said that, it brought so much clarity because I realized
with my work hat on, I really don't like my boss, referring to her husband.
But with my wife hat on, I adore my husband.
He's the kindest, most thoughtful person.
I absolutely love him.
Now you can see exactly what happened there.
And of course, they very quickly worked out that should not be their relationship.
I've come across this so many times, especially in family-run businesses or in businesses
where family members are involved or maybe even just two very close friends.
You know, one of my very closest friends, we started a business together.
We grew up and then as it worked out, you know, I ended up as the CEO with 80 employees.
And, you know, he he was one or two removed from me.
And I had to keep putting my my CEO hat on when I talked to him.
But then after hours, I put my friend hat on.
Now, here's some there's some tricks to making that work.
So I want to share some power hacks, if you like, that really work through this.
But let's also just take a second and say, why is this important?
You know, nepotism favoring family members and so on is a real serious problem.
You know, there was a recent survey in Inc.
Magazine around the asking people.
And it was interesting that nearly half of people who were polled believed that being the boss's child was the secret to getting ahead.
Only a quarter of the people interviewed thought that success comes from just doing good work.
Now, that is really sad.
You cannot have that in an organization.
And even when I employed some of my own children, I used to tell them, you know, your your promotion comes from your first name, not your last name.
And by that, I meant that you stand on your own, you know, as an employee.
And then at home, we're family and we act as though we don't work together.
So, you know, I've seen some of the solutions to this is not employing family members.
That might be a bit extreme.
Some people really love creating businesses they can hand off to their children or have a brother or sister or even parents involved.
But it can absolutely work if you use the two hat solution, because what the two hat solution does is it creates a firewall, a divide between these separate roles.
So what is so if we just use the one hat solution and I'm just one person, it creates all this complexity and it blurs these relational lines.
And it sends a message to the other team members who are not family members that somehow they're on a lower tier of promotion, that somehow.
being the boss's child or spouse or parent is some sort of an advantage and
so we end up with these dual standards that one applies to the family members
and the other applies to everyone else and we cannot you cannot have that and
build a successful team of leaders if some of the leaders feel like you know
we're all equal but some of us are more equal yeah you can't have that so we
have to manage these perceptions and be aware of these conflicting ideas so a
couple of examples so here's some rules to the two hat solution and then I'm
gonna take a minute and give some examples so there's three rules when
applying the two hat solution the first rule is what we call the firewall this
is creating a professional boundary that kid that you have to keep in place to
protect your relationships the second is called the exclusion principle we're
wearing the one hat you pretend the other hat does not exist so in the case
of the husband and wife when they were at work and they had their work hats on
the executive hats on they were acting like they were not married at home when
they got home they acted like they didn't work at the same place so when
you wear the one hat you act like the other hat doesn't exist you exclude it
hence the term exclusion principle so when I'm at when I'm at home I'm your
spouse but when I'm at work I'm your boss and we act like the other hat
doesn't exist exist the third principle is really important it's called the
leveling principle now the leveling principle is the question is would I do
this to someone else would I speak to them this way if we were not related so
if my friend reports to me would I let any other other person reports me do the
same thing if the answer is no then what's happening is we've broken the
leveling in other words would I behave the same if we didn't have a special
relationship would I allow any other employees so let me give some examples
so we had a couple that worked for us and we'll just call them Sally and John
and they work together married couple John's very affectionate guy he would
come in and you know it gives Sally a little a little kiss and get her coffee
and all that stuff and you know it looked innocent enough but there was
something odd firstly Sally was a director in the company John was a
manager one step below but he didn't report to he wasn't in her team that was
on purpose to to not make their relationship any more complex than it
needed to be so one day I asked him and I called him and I said John you're not
doing you're not putting up the firewall when you're at work you have to act like
the two of you are not married yeah yeah I do that I said no you really
don't you show affection and do other things so my let's use the leveling
principle would you go around and kiss other directors on the cheek and bring
them coffee and he blushed and he said no no no of course not that would be
entirely inappropriate I said there's the leveling principle you have to put
the firewall up and act like the two of you are not married and when you get
home you act like you don't work at the same place you can complain about your
terrible boss even if you're referring to your spouse and what this does is it
protects relationships but it also creates a lot more relational space so
when the couple gets home they get to talk about their jobs in a way that's
free as a couple would not as people who are on the same team this is a very very
helpful process so there was another couple where well there were two
brothers and they're in a in working together and what did happen with these
two brothers they found out they had even more than two hats because they
were on the same board of the company they were in the they were on the
management team and they were brothers and then also they were also owners of
the company so this created all these complexities so what they simply started
doing is I'm wearing my owner hat I don't like our board even if you're
talking about yourself or you're sitting on the board and you're saying I'm not
sure we like our CEO even if you're talking about your brother what this
does is it creates firewalls and it creates clear opportunities to be very
very effective so you know I had a situation where I came in as the
president of a company and one of the owners she also worked in the company
and she reported to me so as the president of the company running her
company in some ways I reported to her when she was wearing her owner hat but
when she was wearing her team hat she reported to me so we used to just joke
and say so which hat are you wearing well hang on a second put on your owner
hat so I can tell you owner things and as a president let me tell you as an
owner this and then we'd switch hats and then I could say okay so now
As as you know, with your team hat on,
hey, you need to correct this and this, you need to improve that and so on.
Can you see how this would create tremendous relational space?
So let me summarize again.
The two solutions has three core principles.
The first is the firewall principle.
You must put up a firewall.
A firewall refers to a gap that doesn't allow things to mix in.
So you've got to separate out the roles.
That's what firewall means.
So you can also call it the separation principle.
So you separate out your different roles, count them, how many how many roles?
And we'll keep call each of those and create a separate hat for each role.
So there's the the separation principle.
The second is the exclusion principle.
When we're wearing the one hat, we pretend the other hats do not exist.
So when I'm your boss, I'm not your spouse.
When I'm your spouse, I'm not your boss.
And thirdly, the leveling principle.
And that is while I'm the boss, would I treat any other person
who is in a similar role, who is not related to me in the same way?
Now, is there a level playing field?
The answer to that is no.
Then I haven't really created a proper firewall.
So I hope that was helpful, that this will create huge
relational space with a close relationship.
Doesn't just have to be a family member.
Can also be, you know, a lifelong friend that you're working with.
But when you at work, you have to act like you're not friends.
I know it sounds it sounds maybe complicated to implement.
Actually is extremely simple.
And every single person or leader we've taught this to has come back and said
this was one of the most helpful things I learned in the Edge training.
Enjoy.