Robert and the unreasonable man

“The reasonable man adapts himself to the World; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the World to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”

George Bernard Shaw

Here’s an example.

In the late nineties I joined a national contractor as operations manager. One of the project managers I inherited was responsible for a very challenging building job along with several other important company initiatives. Robert was a really hard working and committed member of staff and was held in high regard and well paid for his efforts.

It soon became apparent to me he was not effective; he worked very long hours though his job was going backwards as were the initiatives he was supposed to be leading. To me he looked tired and stressed though he was admired by management and peers for his dedication and so he kept digging deeper into his energy reserves and refused to be beaten by what was in front of him.

Robert was trying to do everything himself and politely refused my offers of help and additional staff for him to manage.

One day he burst into my office, clearly upset and demanded that I prioritise his workload. I paused, he looked frail and was visibly shaking. Trying to bring some calm I asked him what the matter was and offered to talk things through. He then told me about all things going wrong in his life, all the hours he was putting in and how he was really committed to the company but things had to change as he couldn’t continue like this. He then looked at me and said “so Dave will you prioritise what you want from me”

I said “no, all the things you are working on are equally important and I want you to deliver them all, that’s what you are paid for. I want you to go away and think about how you are going to deliver them all and what resource and support you need”. Without any eye contact he stood up, stormed out and slammed the door behind him.

My heart was pounding. My head was screaming at me … “Dave what are you playing at, how unreasonable was that! You won’t see him again, you have just lost a highly regarded project manager and you have only been here a month, how’s that going to go down” Another voice in my head, just as loud, was saying “I previously offered him help and he refused it so why should I have his monkey on my back and he is paid to deliver results not tasks prescribed by me, that’s not my job”

A few hours later Robert calmly walked into my room and said “right Dave I’ve got it. It’s for me to manage this and I can’t do it on my own. I need two extra people and I would like you to roll up your sleeves and get more involved with two of my clients, also I’d like you to help me learn to delegate because I can’t let go but now I realise I have to”

It would have been very reasonable to have prioritised for him though I am glad I didn’t as we both learned a valuable lesson from the exchange and things changed as a result of it.

Where do you need to be unreasonable in order to make progress?

By the way Robert was held in high regard for the long hours he worked rather that what he actually achieved; nearly twenty years on I still see a lot of that.