Find Five Errors

It is easy to get fascinated by this little game. Two pictures are almost alike, and then our task is to find the five differences or errors. It can be OK for killing time, but less OK if used for killing talent!

I have met many managers who unfortunately use this approach with huge passion. An employee have spent talent and time on exploring an important area, hand in her report, and then you can literally see the “find five errors” look on the managers face. How can we find the holes in the arguments, the errors in typing, the missing pieces etc, etc.? The rational result can of course be that we end up with a more sound recommendation, but the downside is that it creates negative focus, de-motivation and at times even resistance.

Why is this “find five errors”-approach so popular? I would think that partly it is our educational system (I still remember the red line under the words that were misspelled!), but probably even more deeply rooted than that. If you look at a lot of journalism, being it either TV or newspapers, it is more often about finding weak points, creating crooks to make a story, errors in the system etc, etc, than about finding every day hero’s and systems that work well. Anyway, back to management.

Do I mean we should not look for errors? No, that would be counter productive. But it does not have to be the default style and approach for the manager!

I remember a story about a Japanese manager who got an important report in his hands. After reading the report he looked at his employee, smiled and said: “This is very good, now let’s see if we can make it even better”. This is a very different approach with a very different outcome. This approach shows respect for the person and the work that has been done, it creates a joint responsibility for making it even better, and it potentially creates energy around improvement.

Some have learned to say a few positives before they dive into the “real” feedback. It is actually better, but not ideal.

I encourage the approach of starting with “Here are the things I liked the best” and then move on to “Let’s see how we can make it even better”.