TRANSCRIPT:

Hi, I'm Wayne. You know, if you've worked in business culture for more than five minutes, you surely been in a pickle, a tough place, a situation where you saw no path to success without help. You probably ask yourself, “What am I gonna do?” “What are people gonna think of me?” “Have I truly failed?” “What did I do wrong?” “What should I have known?”

You might look around and say, how do other people in my organization solve problems? Do they redouble their efforts? Bargain with coworkers? Are that dreaded: GO TO THE BOSS. CUE: Ominous Music — Dun Dun Dun . . .

You ask, Should I escalate? Well, let me declare: Escalation is NOT Failure. It's an Opportunity. When you take on a task, Take on a job in the organization, the organization is in simple terms asking for you to own it, to make a promise, and be accountable to the promise.

In exchange for that ownership, they give you resources, authority, and direction. Call that R.A.D. — Resources, Authority, and Direction. But there's no guarantee that there's precisely the right amount of each given and consider all the other variables at play. In addition to resources authority and direction.

Your skill, your experience, your coworkers’ skill, your coworkers’ experience, and impact of organizational inertia, disagreements, coworker drama, and on and on. The amount of R.A.D. you're given is merely a best guess allocation from those who've charged you with the task.

But with that reality, that reality that it is just a best guess allocation, it's all too common for someone. Well, for you and I, Who hits that dead end, that roadblock, that place where we don't see a path to success, it's all too common for us to think. We failed.

But remember, I declare, Escalation is NOT Failure. It's an opportunity to level set. So what does this look like? First, know this: you're not giving up. You're not asking for your boss to do it for you. You're looking for R.A.D. You're looking for a level set, possibly more direction, possibly more resources, more authority, You're asking for coaching, for barriers to be broken down, for money, or time, or more people.

Just something beyond what you were given originally. And with that new level, you head out to fulfill your promise. So escalation is not failure. It's an opportunity to level set. And you know, also, escalation is an opportunity for alignment. Next time, we'll talk about conflict and alignment.

What do you think? Leave a comment below!