My wife and I were on vacation in Washington, and decided to go out to dinner at a nice restaurant. I had researched places, and read raving reviews of this place. I walked in expecting one of the best meals of the year.
I was underwhelmed. My wife? She loved it.
We sat at the same table. We ate the same food. We got the same service.
Nothing went wrong. The meal was good, but my expectations had been set, and I spent the evening measuring against those expectations. My wife didn’t have those same expectations, and so everything to her was a delight.
The cost of misaligned expectations at dinner is relatively cheap. When it happens at work it can be costly.
Expectations Evolve
Early on in my career, when I was a senior programmer, I had a similar type of experience. I went in for my annual review. It had been a good year, and I was expecting to hear “exceeds expectations” like I had in previous years.
However, as the conversation unfolded, and we progressed through the categories, it was continually “meets expectations” and “meets expectations.” One category I even had a “needs improvement!”
At the time, the review stung. But as I reflected on it, I realized that the expectations had changed. They should have! I had been in the role for a couple of years, and I had grown, and the needs of the organization had been evolving. The bar had been raised; I just didn’t recognize it.
In my client engagements, when someone is wondering why a person isn’t performing, my first questions are about their expectations and how they communicated them.
Some people think that clarifying expectations and getting aligned is an activity you do once. But my review illustrates that this isn’t the case. Expectations evolve, and alignment drifts.
So, it is useful to think about the expectations you have, where they live, and how you and others learn about them.
Three States of Expectations
Every expectation exists in one of three states.
The first state is invisible. You have the expectation, and you don’t know it. These expectations are only met by accident. You don’t even know you have them until you feel disappointed. That was a hidden expectation. My restaurant expectation was invisible.
The second state is private. You know you have the expectation, but you’re the only one. This is where most workplace expectations live, and they result in a lot of “shoulds.”
“He should have known.” “This should have been done by now.” “I should be further along.”
Every “should” is an expectation that hasn’t been made visible or communicated. The expectations I had about my review were private.
The third state is shared. This is what is needed if expectations are going to be met on purpose. This means what is expected is communicated and agreed to.
So, part of the work of managing expectations is moving them from invisible to private to shared.
First, notice them. When you feel disappointed, frustrated, or surprised by someone, run a quick audit. What were you expecting, and where did that number come from? Listen for “should” statements you’re saying to yourself.
Second, name your expectations. Vague expectations can’t be met, only violated. For example, “They need to step up” isn’t an expectation. At best, it’s an attitude. To make it tangible, name what that looks like, what the related standards are, and how it will be evaluated.
Third, share your expectations. Communicate yours, and ask for theirs. Make agreements you both can commit to, and then put a date on the calendar to revisit it, because things change. Stating expectations once is not the same as keeping them aligned.
The Benefits of Clarity
Having shared expectations impacts working relationships. It promotes cooperation and invites accountability.
With shared expectations, managers move from evaluating their staff to coaching their employees. Instead of people “falling short,” misses become lessons learned and a chance to continue improving. Accountability becomes a natural and understood part of the management process.
Imagine this scenario. There’s a guy in an office named Bob, and every morning, for the last 11 years, Bob has made coffee. He retires, and the office brings in his replacement. Three weeks in, people are grumbling. They say, “He just doesn’t show initiative like Bob did.”
The new guy has no idea they expected coffee! Nobody told him. There’s no coffee documentation. It was an invisible expectation that now is influencing the view of his entire performance.
It seems absurd that this happens over coffee, but think about the roles at your company, and the people filling those roles. How many coffee-making-misses can you find, where the expectations were never shared?
Taking time to share, clarify, and reassess expectations can feel like overhead. However, time spent understanding, stating, and restating expectations is some of the highest-value time you can spend, because expectations impact everything downstream.
My wife and I still laugh about that dinner. Same table, same food, two different experiences. Next time, I’m going to skip the reviews and enjoy the evening.