Making Commitments

by Fred Kofman

Welcome

Why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye and fail to notice the beam in your own eye? We've all experienced people breaking commitments to us, and it's painful, so we notice very clearly when they act without integrity. But are we equally aware when we break our commitments and we create pain for the people around us? It's illogical to think that everybody does it to us, and we don't do it to anyone, because they also think the same. They think that everybody does it to them, and then they don't do it to anyone, including us. We all have this temptation to notice the speck in our brother's eyes, but fail to notice the beam of lack of integrity in our own. We're going to talk about how to fix that. First we'll become painfully aware of how we fail to fulfill commitments and we make unconscious commitments, and then we'll make sure that never happens again, so we live with integrity, and we stop creating suffering around us.

Clarify Requests

You'll be in a conversation, and the other person sooner or later will say, "So, are we in alignment? Let's put this as part of the action item list." And your temptation will naturally be to say, "Yeah, sure." And then all hell breaks loose, because the other person thinks that by putting it in the action item list, you made a firm promise, and you think that, well, somebody's going to take care of it. You could blame the other person for not being clear in their request. But the fact is that by not clarifying it, you are also co-responsible for letting this not-well-formed request move into the action item list. So how can you stop that? How can you make sure that when you agree to something, everybody understands who promises to do what by when? And you then can fulfill the promise and the expectations of the people that think that you've made such promise. Well the first thing is to understand all these dynamics that come into play, and they involve people being, feeling awkward, or being reluctant to ask clearly. 'Cause they think it's abusive. They think it's not very polite. They think it's not nice to say, "I ask that you do X by Y." So they will find ways to finesse this, and to sort of ask, but say, "Hey, you know, if you could, why don't you take a look at this," and you are likely to want to stay in that domain of abstraction, where you say, "Yeah, I'll see what I can do." And that's where the disagreements get seeded. They will blossom later, when they expect you to do something and they get upset, and you get upset because they are upset when you never promised that you were going to do what they think you promised to do. So you have to nip this in the bud. You can't wait until that later moment. You have to stop that conversation from going off track, and make sure you stay within bounds. How do you do that? Well, when you intuit that the other person is asking for your help with someone, you want to clarify what they're asking. And you can do that by saying, "Look, I understand you'd like to get this done, what I hear you asking me is to do X by Y. Am I understanding correctly?" See, then you take the initiative, and you take responsibility. Instead of looking for a way to protect yourself from the responsibility, you want to be the owner of the responsibility. Because the more you can present this image of reliability, of integrity, of seriousness, the more valuable you will be to the people around you. You know, your work is not valuable. What's valuable is the way your work helps them accomplish what they want to do. The work in itself, I mean, you could spend years doing something that nobody cares about, and then say, "Oh, but I worked so hard." Well, your hard work means nothing unless it's in service of someone else that's going to use your work to accomplish what they want to do. It's a fundamental theory in economics. So your value as a professional, your value as a person, is directly related to how you enter into the world of the other person to assist him or her in accomplishing something that is meaningful to them. So it's not what you do, it's how what you do fulfills their needs and meets their needs. So you want to be very sure you understand their needs, and when you say you're going to do something, you want to promise with absolute integrity. The first step to do that is to make sure that the commitment becomes well-structured, well-grounded and clear to every partner. You do this by asking, "I hear you would like to do this, and your request is that I do X by Y." And X by Y need to be so concrete that both you and the other person are crystal clear about what would it take for you to fulfill that request, or not.

What to ask yourself before making a commitment

Do not fall into temptation. When the person that you are interacting with asks you something face-to-face, there's such a strong drive to say yes because you want to be nice. You want to be accommodating. You want to be helpful. And so does everyone else. But that is a very dangerous temptation, because one second that it takes to say yes can commit you for days, weeks of work. And then if you don't feel like doing that work, or even worse, you can't do it because you have other commitments or because you don't have the resources or the skills or you don't understand what the person asked you, well, then you've just put yourself in a impossible situation where you're going to disappoint them 10 times worse, especially if you disappear because you're ashamed that you can't do what you told them you were going to do. So, very important when a person enlists your help or wants to ask for your help, you have to take a moment and say, am I willing to commit? Am I ready to commit, because I'm about to sign a contract. Your integrity is about to be put in play. And if you say yes and then you don't do it, and you let the person down, not only you will produce breakdowns at the level of effectiveness or fulfillment of the task, but you will also create a disruption in the relationship and the trust, because you're not trustworthy.

The Conditions of Integrity

So in order to be trustworthy, you have to be very careful about what you promise to do, and not promise to do things that are, apparently or that you think, are beyond your capabilities. So how do you do this? There are essentially four conditions for integrity that I'm going to recommend you pay attention to before you say yes. The first one is, do I understand what the person is asking. If you are not sure what they're asking, you can clarify. Say, "Please, sir. "What are you asking me to do?". Very concretely. "I understand what you'd like, "but I'm not sure what you're asking me to do. "And what I would promise to do if I say yes." So what and by when. You want to be very clear, and make sure that you and the other person are on the same page. But even after that, then you have to think, do I have the resources to get that done. Can I really promise to do that? And you need to make a little mental plan of what it will take to deliver the promise before you say yes. And it could be as simple as checking your mental calendar to see do you have an appointment for tomorrow at three. It could be getting your personal device from your pocket and checking now do I have that time open. Or it make take a long time to go back and do planning for an extensive project, and you can tell the person, "Let me get back to you tomorrow" or "Let me get back to you in a week "because I have to check that I have the resources "that will be required to do this and "to know what resources are required need to make a plan." So understand the promise that you're making. Understand the requirements and feel confident that you can deliver with a certain level of certainty. And then ask yourself, do I really want to do this. Is this something I'm willing to commit? Cause being able doesn't mean you have to do it. You have to make a choice. And it's not obvious. I've worked, sometimes of course you have to accept people's requests if you can do them, but not always. And there's a temptation to say yes too fast. And then realize that it's very onerous or you don't feel like doing this and so on. So do a moment of checking inside, and then if you come out with a yes, feel this small voice inside, and if the voice says, "Yes; yes I want to do this," then you can commit strongly. The last part is preparing to fail. I know that sounds counterintuitive. Why would you prepare to fail? But you're not preparing to fail, you're preparing to fail safe. That is you have to prepare so that if something happens and you cannot deliver on the commitment, you won't let the other person down. How do you do that? Well first, you need to mechanism to keep track of the process. So for example, if you say you are going to deliver a shipment in a week, well what happens tomorrow and the next day and the next day and the next day so after a week, the shipment will be delivered to the customer. So you have this process, and you need to have a tracking mechanism to know if the process is going properly or not. Because if the process goes astray, then you need to have a communication means to reach out to your creditor, the person that you're making the promise, to let him or her know that something went wrong. And then you can have a conversation about how you'll fix it. And that's what I mean by failing safe. You have to prepare for things to happen that are out of your plan. There's a famous story of Mike Tyson when he was about to fight for the championship. And I don't remember his opponent, but they were interviewing both of them. And they asked the opponent of Mike Tyson, "Now what's your strategy?". He said, "Well, you know, I'm going to start by "jabbing and then I'll hit him below." Anyway, he had this very complicated story. And then the journalist turned to Tyson and said, "Mike, what's your strategy?". Mike Tyson said, "Everybody has a strategy "until they get punched in the face." You're going to get punched in the face by reality. So all your great strategy and all your plans sooner or later are going to encounter something unexpected. And when you encounter something unexpected, are you ready to stay robust? Meaning can you maintain the system in spite of the unexpected punch in the face? A fundamental part of maintaining the system is keeping your integrity, and letting the creditor know that something happened. And negotiating the creditor how to fix the problem.

Report a commitment at risk

So you made a clear promise. You had the skills. You had the resources. You had the plan. You're tracking. And then, all hell breaks loose. Something goes wrong. Another famous saying from a Prussian military man, Helmuth von Moltke is, "No battle plan survives first contact with the enemy". I mean, you have a plan, and then the enemy, meaning the world, or luck, or Murphy will put something in to block your path. But that's life. And now you know that you're not going to be able to deliver on time. In fact, you never know that you're not going to be able. Rarely. Most of the time, it's a risk. The risk just went from negligible to, I don't know, a 50% chance. And there's another temptation there, which is to say, "Oh if I work "really hard and I push it, I don't "have to call the other person because "it's not nice to call someone and say "Hey I don't think I'm going to be able to deliver "It feels stressful and they may get angry. "I don't to disappoint you, so I'd rather "work really hard and not call you early, "if I can avoid calling you all the better." The problem is this betting with the other person's money. Because the person is waiting for me to deliver something they need. They ask me because they need it for some reason, and I promised to deliver, so if now, I have a 50% chance to not deliver, why it's like playing roulette with their money because if I don't deliver, they pay the price. Something bad is going to happen to them. I don't even know how bad it is. I may think well 50%, maybe yes, maybe no but maybe this is absolutely crucial. How would you feel if an engineer says, "Well 50% the plane falls, 50% doesn't. "I don't need to fix this". Now you're on the plane, how would you feel if the engineer says, "It's not a big deal, it's only 50%". Well a 50% chance that the plane might fall? You wouldn't get on that plane, but the engineer says, "Well, I don't "want to upset the passengers. "Maybe I'll frighten them, so I don't want to tell the passengers that there's a 50% chance" Of course you want an engineer to tell you, and of course you want people to tell you if there's a 50% chance. So, don't do unto others what you don't want others to do unto you. So if you want people to tell you, you need to tell the other people, even though, there is a friction, because it will be nicer not to have the emotional upheaval of telling them and seeing them get upset and so on. It's still your responsibility as a person of integrity to alert people that there is a significant risk of nondelivery, and then let them react to that. Maybe they want to renegotiate or not.

How to make an effective apology

The moment your tracking mechanism alerts you that there's a problem, something unexpected, that has material impact on your ability to deliver. Of course, there's lots of things that are unexpected, but they don't matter. Now, let's just say something that matters comes up. Well, you have to call your creditor, and that's why you need to prepare to have a mechanism to call your creditor. So, for example, whenever I schedule a meeting with someone, I want to have their phone number, and I want them to have mine. Why? 'Cause something could happen in the last 10 minutes. So I want them to be able to call me and say, look I'm stuck in traffic or something happened, and I want to be able to do the same. So, you have that mechanism, and then you have call your creditor, you made a promise, call your creditor. So let's just say, I have to call you because I promised that I would meet you, and something came up. Now, the closer I call you to the time of the meeting, the worst, because there's a higher cost. Like if you're already in the place where I'm going to meet, it's different than if the meeting was for tomorrow, but if the meeting is for tomorrow, and you already said no to another things, that's some expense that we wouldn't have if I called you a week before, before you've made, you know, any big changes in your schedule, and so on. So, the earlier I can call you the better. So I will call you, and I say, look I'm really sorry, I have to apologize 'cause I made a promise that we were going to meet, and I got a phone call from an urgent matter at work, a phone call from my boss describing an urgent matter at work that I feel I need to take care of. So I'd like to apologize and ask you, what consequences would have for you if we reschedule our meeting for some other day, and if it's a serious consequence, I'd like to clean up the mess, I'd like to see what can I do to minimize the consequence. Just take a second and feel, how would you respond to that kind of message? Now of course, there's some bitterness, it's like, oh, well I was hoping that we would see each other, hopefully you want to see me, that's why you asked to see me, but you would appreciate that I didn't just let you down. What is it that I did to maintain the trust and the integrity in the face of a task breakdown? Because we had a task, which was to meet, and that is not going to happen, at least not according to the plan that we had both made. But there are other things that I did that would allow us to stay connected, stay in sync, and stay trusting one another, and perhaps even trust each other more than before. First, I called you. Second, I apologize, I honor, I accepted that I had made a commitment to you, and I was letting you down. I'm not trying to hide that, I'm not trying to give you excuses, no justification. This is a fact. Then I explain to you, not justify myself, but just explain to you what happened. And I explain to you what happened just a few minutes ago, I just got a phone call from, it wasn't like, oh well you know, two weeks ago, my boss asked me to do that, and I just didn't want to call you, because I was trying to renew. That destroys trust. 'Cause you could ask me, Fred, why didn't you call me before? I mean, you knew two weeks ago that you had to do this big piece of work, and that you couldn't meet with me, and you left me hanging, and I said no to a whole bunch of people that wanted me to do other things, because I was saving the time, and now, you know, you're not here. I cannot tell you how many times I've had video conferences, phone meetings, or even in-person meetings, and I get a text five minutes later saying, sorry I can't make it. And I'm like, what?! Now you tell me you can't make it? Something like that happened just last week. I had a video conference, and I'm sitting there in the video conference, and I get a text from a person from another country saying, actually it was even from the assistant saying, you know, so and so can't make it. He asked me to please express his apologies. I'm like, you're crazy! I mean, this is seriously expensive, and there was no explanation, he can't make it. I don't have a high level of trust that I can work well with this person from now on. I mean, I'm going to raise it when I see this person, but there's trust broken. And it wasn't because he didn't come to the meeting, it's because he let me know too late, without an explanation, and he didn't even do it personally, and that happened last week, and he even didn't call me afterwards. I mean, maybe in the moment, could have been the assistant, but then, he didn't call me two hours afterwards to apologize. So, don't do that. If you are going to break a commitment, call the other person yourself or let them know yourself. Explain what happened. And explain what happened in a way that the other person can't ask you, why didn't you call me before? Because it has to be something that was out of the plan that you didn't know when you made the commitment, and it's something that you just discovered. So the other person has to say or has to think, you know, that could have happened to me, and it's understandable. So for example, if you call late to a meeting, oh traffic is terrible, and traffic is always terrible, that doesn't count. Now if there was an accident, and I say, well look I'm stuck because a truck just turned over, and the freeway's closed. Okay, and it just happened, and you're calling, that could happen to anyone, the other people would say, okay, too bad, and maybe you say, how can I make it up? What can we do? Can I participate in the meeting by phone, or can we use, you know, the video link, and I can be in the meeting, but because it's going to take me a half an hour to get there. Now that's an act of integrity. And even though you're not in the meeting physically, you can still participate in the meeting, and you can preserve the relationship of trust. So the last thing, I mentioned this a couple times, is that after you explain, you inquire about the consequences to the other person. You don't assume you know. I taught this to my kids, and when I taught this to my kids they say, but dad, no, you don't want to, I mean you're, if you ask them they'll tell you how bad it was, and then, you know, you're indebted. I say, yeah well, but this is not to minimize your debt, you are in debt, because you made a promise, and you know, they have a right to ask you for compensation, and you're asking how did I do something that created trouble for you, because I'd like to fix it, I'd like to minimize the consequences. So, it's counterintuitive, because you feel sheepish, and you don't want to, kind of, you know, rub salt in the wound, and then tell the person, you know, I know I hurt you, I'd like to know how and what I can do now, and so on. It puts you in a weak negotiating position if what you're trying is to minimize your effort, but that's not the goal. The goal is not to minimize your effort, but to maximize your trustworthiness. And you maximize how trustworthy you are, by inquiring the consequences for the other person. And then the last step is minimizing them. What can I do? What can we do? What would help you now? And you finish with another commitment. So you make a recommitment or you make another promise to take care of your creditor in the face of the breakdown that you just create.

How to build trust

It's counterintuitive that's it's possible to build trust in the event of breaking a promise. You say well how can that be? If you break a promise you destroy trust. But those are two different things. I'd like to share a couple stories. I was in Europe, and I had promised my daughter, Sophie, that I would get back to her birthday party that was on Saturday. We lived in Colorado. The company that I was working with had a very important decision to make, and they couldn't make the decision on Friday, and the CEO asked me, can you stay? We'll finish on Monday. And you know, I couldn't. I mean I had promised my daughter that I would be there for her birthday, it wasn't a trivial thing. So I told him I couldn't commit, but I would check. So I called my daughter that evening. It was in Europe. Colorado was the morning. I called her and I said to her, Sophie look, I explained the situation, I was asked to stay here, it's a very important thing. I'd like to stay, but I promised I would go back. So if you want me back, I will be there. I'm taking the plane tomorrow morning and I'll be there at noon, so I can be in your birthday party. But I'd like to ask you, is there anything in the world that you would like so much, that you would prefer that next Saturday, than me in your party tomorrow. And without a seconds hesitation, she said skydiving. I was shocked because she didn't give me a second. I said what? Yeah, I want to jump off an airplane. She was going to be 14. I was taken aback. I said what, I don't know. Let me check. So I called, there's an aero club in Boulder, and I called the club and I said my daughter would like to do a tandem jump, do you have this thing? He said yeah yeah, we can do that, how old is your daughter going to be? I said it was a birthday present, so I told him 14. He said oh I'm so sorry, you have to be 18 to do the tandem jump. But we have glider flights that are very exciting. And the way she said very exciting had this ominous tone like it was, it was not a good thing. Exciting for a kid but something in my gut told me that was not going to be a good thing for me. I said okay, let me check with my daughter. So I called Sophie, I explained what I discovered. I said glider flight is great, so we're fine daddy. And we did that. So I stayed. I didn't go to the birthday party with her friends, I mean we had a party when I arrived on Tuesday, but it was a different thing. I broke my promise. But I broke it in a way that we went on the glider ride and it was wonderful, and in a sense, we had more trust afterwards than before. Because I had treated her like my creditor. She's a person. Now in contrast to my daughter, I had a dog. I had a German shepherd, Lila was her name. And when I was working at the computer, Lila would come and with her muzzle, just lift my hands off the keyboard, like let's go run, let's go run. I loved running with her. And I would tell, well wait a minute, in half an hour. I mean it's just something I would say to my dog. And then I get stuck working and it's two hours before. I never apologized to my dog. I never told her I'm sorry Lila, I told you half an hour, but we're not going to go running now, I still have some work to do. I never did. Why? Because she's a dog. I don't feel I'm bound to my promises to dogs. But what's the implication? If I hadn't called my daughter, of if I had just told my daughter, sorry you know I can't go, I'd be treating my daughter like a dog. I'd be treating her like a non person. Like someone who's unable to hold someone else accountable for their word. I don't expect my dog to hold me accountable because she's not a person. That's the definition of a person. Someone that can make commitments, and hold other people accountable for those commitments. So when I treat my daughter, a colleague, an employee, anybody in that way, I'm saying you're a non person. It's the ultimate act of disrespect. In contrast, when I apologize, I explain, I renegotiate, I ask the other person to free me out for the commitment, but I make it worth their wild in the renegotiation, I'm telling them you are a person. You matter to me. You deserve my integrity. You deserve my honoring my word to you. And that builds trust. So take a moment to think, who are you treating like a dog in your professional and your personal life.