Understanding each other’s everyday reality

I have been a manager since 2010. As a middle manager, as CFO and as CEO. Over those years I have collected a few expressions that I return to again and again. They have become a benchmark for me, whether it concerns employees, customers or suppliers.

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I want to share two of them here. They have one thing in common. Both are about knowledge, and about how we become better leaders when we know more about the people we work with.

Understanding each other's everyday reality

“We need to understand each other's everyday reality.” I have said it in management teams, in negotiations and over coffee. So what do I mean by that?

When we are going to achieve something together, it isn't enough to agree on the goal. Often it is precisely understanding each other's everyday reality that lets us reach agreement in the first place, for example in a business negotiation. I need to understand what your day looks like. What you are prioritising right now, who else is waiting for an answer from you and which reports have to be in before Friday. Only then do I know how I can help, and when it's the wrong moment to add yet another thing.

But it works both ways. It is just as important that you understand my everyday reality. What drives me, what I have to deliver and why I sometimes push.

Much of the friction I have seen in organisations has not been about ill will. It has been about not seeing each other's everyday reality.

Being right and getting your way

A former boss of mine used to say: “There's a hell of a difference between being right and getting your way.” Excuse the language, but it has stuck with me.

I have thought about it in business negotiations, in reorganisations and in perfectly ordinary conversations about priorities. You can have the best analysis in the room and still get nowhere. To get your way, others need to understand and want to come along. That requires me to know where they stand.

This is where the two expressions connect. Whoever understands the other party's everyday reality has a much easier time getting their way. Not by arguing harder, but by landing the message where it can actually be received. It is knowledge, not rhetoric, that makes the difference.

Take a business negotiation. I have never seen a good partnership grow out of a deal where only one party won. If it is going to last over time, it has to be a win for both. And to find that, I need to know what really matters to the other party, not just what they say in the room.

The same applies in a team. A change where the organisation wins but the employees lose rarely lasts. When both sides see what they get out of it, it does. It sounds simple, but it requires knowledge of each other. The more we know, the better decisions we can make together.

We don't make decisions in a vacuum

One thing I have learned, often the hard way, is that how we feel in body and mind affects how we act. After a long week with a heavy workload I make different decisions than when I am rested. I listen less well, I jump to conclusions faster and I have less patience with whatever doesn't fit.

Research confirms that stress affects how we make decisions. Whether they get better or worse depends on the situation and the task [2]. But the point is clear. Our state is not neutral.

It also applies to how we receive information. There are moments when a group is receptive to difficult news or a new idea, and moments when the same message bounces off. Dropping a major change on a team in the middle of a heavy delivery period is a good example of how you can be right and still not get your way.

Time is what's missing

There is one thing that makes all of this harder than it sounds. Time.

Many managers today have both an operational role and a leadership role. You deliver yourself while also leading others. Getting a feel for a team and making the right decisions takes time, and that is often exactly the time that isn't there.

Gallup has found that the manager accounts for at least 70 percent of the variance in engagement between teams. Engagement is also highest where employees have some form of daily contact with their manager [1]. To me, that says the human encounter cannot be replaced. I would say it is more important than ever.

This is where I see the opportunity with digital tools and AI. Not as a replacement for the meeting, but as a way to make it more valuable. If I already know before the team meeting that focus has dropped, or that the workload has been high for a few weeks, I can ask the right questions from the start. We get more out of the conversation and reach solutions faster. I can also choose the right moment for the difficult decisions. It's the same principle as in the negotiation. With better knowledge of each other, it becomes easier to find what works for both.

Research also offers an important reminder. In a study of 758 consultants at Boston Consulting Group, those who used AI worked both faster and better on tasks the tool handled well. On a harder task, which the researchers chose precisely because it lay outside what the tool could handle, those who used AI were instead more likely to reach the wrong answer [3]. Technology makes us better when it gives us a basis for decisions. The judgement is still ours.

That is how I see what we do at Zmartrest. We help managers and teams understand each other's everyday reality a little earlier, so that the human meetings can be about what really matters.

What makes it worth it

Finally, I want to say something about why I still think it is the best job there is.

Few things beat the feeling when a team achieves something they first thought was impossible. Or when an employee grows into a task they themselves hesitated over, and suddenly does it better than anyone could have imagined.

I remember an employee in whom I saw great leadership potential early on. They had a fantastic ability to create engagement and warmth while driving the work forward. They didn't see it at all themselves. When I asked about a management role, they were very surprised. We talked, reasoned and let it take some time. In the end they accepted and became one of the most appreciated leaders in my team. Being part of a journey like that is hard to describe. It's a bit like watching someone discover something in themselves that you have seen all along.

When I look back on those moments, they have almost always had something in common. We understood each other's everyday reality, everyone saw what they got out of it and we made the decisions when we had the strength to carry them. It was a win for both sides.

In summary

If I had to sum up my years as a leader in one sentence, it would probably be this: understand each other's everyday reality, and it becomes much easier to get your way together. It is knowledge that makes us better leaders. Knowledge about each other, about the state of the team and about when we have the strength to make the big decisions.

Consider one thing: how well do you really know the everyday reality of the people you depend on?