Transparency ≠ Saying everything
Transparency = Sharing the full context
Why do many leaders struggle with being transparent?
They fall short of their egos. They want to make decisions. That’s why they became leaders, right?
Wrong.
The leaders’ job is to enable the organization to make the best decision fast. How?
They have to make the context of the work accessible to the people who will need to make a decision. If engineers are designing a solution, they have to have access to all relevant information about the problem they are solving, even the financial and business information.
Leaders’ job is to make ALL the information accessible to their teams even when the organization is not transparent.
Where do we draw the line and not share information? When it hurts someone’s confidentiality or when the information is irrelevant.
Information such as organizational restructuring, personal improvement plans, compensation details, etc., can be sensitive. Also, there is no need to overload the team with irrelevant information as it will distract them from what’s important.
Besides, nobody can get wrong by sharing the full context of the work with their teams.
Next time you think about transparency, ask yourself, “Does the information I am carrying bring context to the person, or does it create a noise?” If it’s a noise, keep it. If not, share!
