How to Manage Expectations...and Thrive
Some strategies for balancing trust and communication
Happy Friday Everyone!
Managing expectations, especially in a professional setting, can be one hell of a delicate balancing act.
Whether you’re dealing with colleagues, clients or your manager, setting clear expectations is crucial to ensuring smooth workflows and maintaining positive and healthy relationships across the board.
This, week, I’ll delve into a few strategies that have worked for me in this context over the years.
Here goes……
Communicate Clearly and Often
The most important thing I’ve learned is the power of communicating clearly and frequently. Throughout the time-frame of any project that I am assigned to, I make it a point to discuss deliverables, deadlines and goals with all stakeholders. This helps ensure that everyone is on the same page.
A general rule-of-thumb I follow is to set up weekly check-ins with my manager (or whoever I am supposed to report to) in order to provide regular updates. This allows me to get immediate feedback and iterate along the way..
This sounds quite obvious but I have come across many colleagues who don’t focus on communication and are keen to get to the delivery phase ASAP.
Set Realistic Goals
Setting goals that are realistic has been another key strategy that I have followed.
When I took on my first job I often found myself wanting to ‘promise the world’ as I was eager to make my mark and impress everyone.
With time, however, I’ve learned that overpromising and, subsequently, underdelivering can quickly erode trust and that is very hard to regain.
I, now, take time to do an assessment of my workload and capacity before committing to new tasks/projects.
As an example, I was assigned to a new project a few months back and I knew it was going to require a lot more time than initially allocated. I took it up with my manager upfront and we, as a result, revised the whole project plan with longer deadlines and more flexibility.
This approach not only helps with setting more realistic timelines but also prevents last-minute panicking or disappointments.
Learn to Say No
Learning to say no isn’t easy and was a tough one for me initially. It has, however, been a game-changer.
I have realized that saying yes to everything only leads to burnout, decreased productivity and, ultimately, disappointment.
Now, thus, if I feel as if I have a lot to take care of already, I politely refuse to take on more work. This, of course, depends on the task/project and how crucial it is but, unless it’s a high priority deliverable, one often has the liberty of being transparent.
Recently, for instance, a colleague asked for help with a forecasting model that he had developed, and although I wanted to support him, I knew that if I did, I would be working late nights for the coming week or so. I politely explained that to him and he got help from someone else.
Keep Everyone in the Loop
Being transparent is key when it comes to managing expectations. If there are unexpected delays or unforeseen hurdles, I try to flag them with the relevant parties as soon as possible.
For instance, if a project I am looking after is likely to go over budget, I do not wait for the vendor invoices to arrive before informing my manager.
Escalating such bottlenecks early on helps maintain trust and, in my experience, is always appreciated.
All in all, managing expectations all about communication, transparency and not overpromising. These strategies have helped me a lot in building strong professional relationships and ensuring positive outcomes overall.
I enjoyed your article Nausherwan. I remember Partners would always promise the Earth to win the work and then let the team deliver on it. Without caring that it was almost impossible to deliver! Not sure if that was the same in your firm or not.
Good approaches to use for success- managing, communicating and setting expectations.