It was one of those days when the bus should have been rolling down the highway smoothly and steadily. Instead, Drew was annoyed to find he had to keep hitting the brakes to slow down for someone who was drifting around between lanes. Drew did not like the lane changers at all. To Drew’s mind, they are members of a dangerous breed, made up of people who swerve constantly because they’ve lost focus. People think changing lanes will get you there faster, but Drew understands that is just an illusion. It’s simple science, he thinks, that the shortest route from Point A to Point B is a straight line. It takes loyalty, patience, and faith to remain in your lane and stay focused on the road ahead of you—especially if you happen to glance over and see a tempting stretch of open road that you believe is calling your name. Drew fervently hopes his team will not fall for that siren song. Focus is what he needs from them. Sweet, sweet focus.
I know that we’re all tempted to “change lanes” at times. Sometimes you’ll be running along at a brisk clip, doing your job and doing it well, and you’ll look over at the person in the next lane and see what she is—or isn’t—doing. And then maybe your first instinct is to drift over into that lane and get involved, to somehow help that person do her job better, faster, or smarter.
Runners fall into this trap more often than you might think, because they are so focused on moving that bus along and always trying to pick up speed. But there’s a fine line between helping the organization as a whole to accelerate and meddling in someone else’s job. When you spend too much time focused on what others are doing, you risk losing sight of your own job, if only temporarily.
The shortest route from Point A to Point B is a straight line.
For example, when we first opened RCA we had a phenomenal employee who went above and beyond in her area as well as helping out in the classroom and with the after-school programs. She really supported the students and was an awesome contributor. Every now and then, however, she would see something that she felt the need to check on, and I’d get an email from her that said something like “You might want to go ahead and arrange for security for that event next week” or “Who is going to do carpool on Thursdays now that so-and-so isn’t doing it anymore?” Well, she didn’t handle security issues or the carpool schedule—I did. And she was just about the best employee you could hope for, but I wanted to say to her, “Stay in your lane! I’ve got this.”
Before RCA I worked with another teacher who is a giver. He loves to make sure that everybody’s taken care of, and he loves to help people out. He’s a Runner, but he’ll look over at Joggers and Walkers who aren’t going as fast and try to help them move faster. It’s almost like he grabs hold of them and tries to pull them along—but it slows him down in the process. The others may speed up some, so he’s clearly helping them. But now maybe he’s jogging instead of running. It was frustrating for me because these kinds of efforts don’t help the organization as a whole. I saw he wasn’t really focused on completing his tasks because he was so busy helping others.
I see this happen in the business world as well. I had a friend who was trying to get a promotion. Every time we went out to dinner, she would talk about her colleagues, how she was helping them along, and how she’d pull the weight on certain projects. When someone in her department didn’t know how to handle a situation with a client, she said, “Let’s handle it this way” and stepped in and wrote an email for him. So when it came time for the promotion, she didn’t get it—it went to one of the people she had helped so much. And I want to stress that it’s good to support people, to mentor those with less experience. But you don’t want to do it in ways that detract from your own performance.
Sometimes, when I see people switching lanes, I want to tell them, “You’re too focused on all this stuff that’s not your responsibility. If you put more focus on just making sure you handle all your own stuff, I think you’ll be even more productive.” I do expect my staff to support and uplift one another, but that should not happen to the detriment of your own list of goals and accomplishments. You want to cheer for everyone and assist when needed, but you don’t want to do anyone’s job for them, and you don’t want to sacrifice your tasks to help others complete theirs. If everyone were to concentrate on accomplishing their own tasks and doing them well, they would go much faster than if they were drifting over to give their two cents about everybody else’s tasks.
Don’t drift into the next lane—keep your eyes on the road in front of you!