Keep an open mind
If you’re truly seeking feedback from your employees that can help you work through a difficult time, you need to show them that their opinion has influence. So when someone brings Glimcher an idea, he tosses it right back in their lap.
“I try to never guide the decisions,” Glimcher says. “If someone presents something to me and they ask me, ‘Do you want to do A, B or C?’ I don’t answer them. I ask them, ‘What would you do? Why would you do it? Why would you recommend doing that?’ It’s empowering them to make the decision and make the recommendation. Guess what? I don’t always agree with it. But I want to know what someone thinks we should do.”
Glimcher recalls an asset financing deal where he did not see things the same way as his chief financial officer and his chief investment officer.
“I had made up my mind of what I wanted to do,” Glimcher says. “Our CFO and chief investment officer, they had a very different idea. And they were right and I deferred to them. I didn’t go in there and tell them, ‘Here is what we’re going to do.’ I actually went around the table and I got everyone else’s input and then I told them, ‘That’s not what I was planning on doing, but I think what you’re recommending makes sense and I think the reasons you’ve given me make sense, so I’m going to support it.’”
Glimcher had an opinion about how to pay down his company’s debt. But he respected the expertise of his leadership team to help him reach the best decisions to accomplish that goal.
“You have to rely on your people to play their position well,” Glimcher says. “Ultimately, I’m going to set the game plan, but I’m also going to set it with a lot of people’s input. There are some times where we come down to decision making and I feel very strongly. I believe this the right thing for the company and going in a different direction would be detrimental. I’ll override whoever I have to override.
“That’s how it goes. In the example I cited, I thought we would have been better off, but we’re not going to be hurt in any way by going in that direction. I’m not going to hurt the company just to make somebody happy. If everybody has input and we make a good quality decision, even if it’s not my decision, I’ll support it.”
One of the ways to help you judge if your people are making a smart decision, aside from gathering more feedback, is to make sure you know their history.
“Is this an area where they are really strong?” Glimcher says. “Is this an area where they are OK? Or is there an area where they are weak? If someone is passionate about something and you’ve seen through experience that that area is a weakness for them, you probably don’t listen to them as much. If it’s a strong area for them and they’re passionate about it, you probably better listen a little bit better.”
