By Cali Williams Yost
What's one of the biggest mistakes that I see people make when they present a proposal to work more flexibly to their manager? They focus on "why" they want to work differently, when they should emphasize "how" they are going to get their job done.
Here's a true story that a manager shared with me that perfectly illustrates the different response you will get.
A young man walks into the manager's office. He explains that he'd like to talk about shifting his hours to come in by 11:00 am on Tuesday and Thursday mornings and leave later in the evening. This new schedule will help him train for a marathon, "because it's getting too dark to run at night." The manager confessed that his response was, "Yeah, and I'd like to ride in a hot air balloon on Wednesdays. I'm going to have to say 'No'."
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Thankfully, the young man came back the next day and took a different approach. He never mentioned marathon training. Instead he focused on how he would get his work done with the new schedule, how he would communicate with customers and his team, and how he would come in if something important needed to get done. And he would be happy to review the flexible work plan in three months. The manager thought about it and responded, "Okay, let's give it a shot."
The manager telling the story said that the first time he felt like he was being asked to do an unreasonable favor. But the second time, the young man had reframed the proposal as a win-win and he felt comfortable saying "yes." Same proposal, different response.
This is even more critical when you are asking for flexibility to address a personal issue that would be very difficult to say "no" to based on the reason alone.
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For example, this past week, I heard the story of a woman who worked at an accounting firm. She had direct client responsibility and periodically worked on projects that required long hours to turn around quickly. She proposed a schedule that allowed her to leave work at 5:30 p.m. every night to be with her children. She didn't want to log in later in the evening to finish up projects that needed to be completed and she expected to be paid her full-time salary.
Not wanting to appear unsupportive, her employer hesitated but agreed to the plan because they felt badly saying "no." It didn't take long before her colleagues and her manager began to struggle with the inflexibility of her 5:30 p.m. departure and perceived unfairness of her new schedule and compensation. The nature of her job didn't match what she was trying to achieve with her work+life fit.
After a month, her manager told her it couldn't continue. Naturally, the woman was hurt and confused. She was angry at her employer because "They said 'yes' and now it seems to be a big problem."
The conflict could have been avoided if everyone had ignored "why" she wanted to change her schedule and focused on "how" her work was going to get done.
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Perhaps she would have suggested taking on a different role that wasn't client facing and had a more consistent workflow. Perhaps she would have proposed officially reducing her hours and pay so that others wouldn't perceive unfairness. But none of that win-win creativity happens unless you stay focused on the "how," because everyone's "why" makes sense especially to them.
Bottom line: If you want your manager to approve a proposal to work flexibly and you want that flexibility to succeed day-to-day then focus on "how" you will get your work done and not on "why" you want the flexibility. You will end up with a work+life fit that will succeed.
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