We Are Shown What We Want to See

People follow the path of least friction, mental energy and hassle.

That is not a criticism. It is how most of us get through a working day. We read the room, we work out what is expected, and we give it. Not because we are dishonest, but because it is easier than the alternative.

So people show us what we always want to see.

This means that, sooner or later, every leader is looking at a reflection of their own expectations, and calling it information.

We are shown what we want to see.

Three rooms, three pictures

The same organisation, the same project and the same people can produce three very different pictures of reality. The difference is not in the project. It is in what the people at the top have signalled they want.

If we want to see successful projects, we will hear promising success stories and narratives about progress. Milestones described as on track. Issues described as being managed. Every update with a confident close.

If we want to hear all the problems, risks and issues, we are likely to get a project register with a clear list of challenges. Not because the project has more problems, but because the problems now have somewhere to go.

If we punish the bearer of bad news, we will hear only good news. And bad news only when it is too late.

The third is the most dangerous, because punishment is rarely announced. It is rarely even intended. It is a sigh in the steering committee. A question that sounds like an accusation. A raised eyebrow at the person who flagged the risk, and warm thanks for the person who reported green. Nobody needs to be disciplined. People only need to see it happen once.

Blending in

We adapt our behaviours to blend in, to comply with what is expected.

This is the part leaders often miss. The people bringing them reports are not trying to deceive. They are doing what people in every organisation do: reading the signals and fitting in. A project manager who has watched a colleague get grilled for an honest amber learns what amber costs. A finance officer who raised a reconciliation problem and was told to “come back with solutions” learns to come back only when there is one.

Each adjustment is small and reasonable. Over time, they add up to a reporting culture that tells the leader exactly what the leader has taught it to say.

A familiar pattern

Consider a council eighteen months into replacing its finance and payroll system.

The CEO is under pressure. Council has been told the program is on track, and elected members are asking about it. At a steering committee, the project manager reports that data migration is behind and that payroll testing has surfaced problems with award interpretation. The CEO’s response is short: this needs to be fixed, and he does not want to keep hearing about it.

He means that the problem should be solved. The room hears something else.

The next report is green. So is the one after. Issues are described as “being worked through.” The risk register stays tidy. Everyone at the steering committee feels a little better.

Six weeks before go-live, a trial pay run fails to reconcile for a third of the workforce. The problems had been known inside the project team for months. They had simply stopped travelling upward.

Nobody lied. Nobody hid anything in a way they would recognise as hiding. They had learned what the CEO wanted to see, and they showed it to him.

Now consider a different sponsor in the same situation. When the project manager reports the payroll problem, she thanks her for raising it, asks what is needed, and asks to see the same issue at the next meeting, with progress against it. Over the following months, the register gets longer before it gets shorter. The reports are less comfortable to read. And the payroll problem is fixed four months before go-live, instead of discovered six weeks before it.

Same project. Same team. The difference was what the person at the top had shown they wanted to see.

It starts with us

As executives and decision-makers, it is up to us to encourage the culture of transparency and truth.

Not by asking for it in a memo. Every leader says they want honesty. People do not listen to what leaders say they want. They watch what happens to the person who delivers it.

That means thanking the person who brings the bad news, especially when it is inconvenient. It means asking for the risk register before the progress summary. It means treating an amber report as useful information rather than a failure, and being gently suspicious of a program that has been green for too long.

It requires a lot of patience. The first honest reports will be uncomfortable. Some will arrive later than you would like, because once people have learned to be careful, trust takes time to rebuild. And for a while, the picture will look worse, simply because it has become more accurate.

But it is going to be worth it.

The questions that remain

Here are some questions to ponder.

What have you signalled, perhaps without meaning to, that you want to see?

When did someone last bring you bad news early, and what happened to them afterwards?

And if every report on your desk were a mirror rather than a window, what would it be showing you about yourself?