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Beverly Flaxington is a practice management consultant. She answers questions from advisors facing human resource issues. To submit yours, email us here.
Dear Bev,
We have a woman on our team, call her “Mary,” who has been with us for over a decade. She is diligent, committed, and easy to be around. Recently, we implemented a new technology to help with our client servicing. Admittedly, the technology is tough to use, but we’ve had several training sessions. While some of us — the tech geeks — are getting it, others are really struggling with how to update processes to include our new tech.
Mary, in particular, has had a negative attitude about this change. Every time I look up from my desk, she is standing over my cubicle with a printout or a sour look on her face, complaining about how this technology is ruining her life. Her job is not in jeopardy with this change. In fact, she has an enhanced role now as the technology allows her to focus on more client-touch activities.
Are there times when you make changes that a person no longer fits the culture and has to be moved out? I don’t really want to put Mary on a performance plan, but I’m leaning that way because her negativity is bad for the firm as a whole. Do I give her additional training? That feels to me like I am singling her out for her incompetence.
O.S.
Dear O.S.,
Whoa! Before I address your issues with Mary — and I do have a number of thoughts to share — let’s talk about applying negative adjectives to someone’s behavior. You have stated Mary has been a strong performer for over 10 years, but then your last word in your note to me is saying she is “incompetent.” You may not have to meant to write it this way, but you didn’t caveat by saying “perceived incompetence.”
I understand you are frustrated, and when we get frustrated, we aren’t as objective. I suggest first you take an objective approach to Mary’s behavior rather than label it something negative. I am not looking for you to characterize her as other than you think she is, but we lose our power when we use negative language or label something negatively. We are not as able to step back and review a situation with a critical eye to understand what steps will serve us best.
Mary’s behavior may not make sense to you, but you and she may be wired very differently. I do a lot of work with behavioral style, and there are three important things to keep in mind:
- Some people do much better with change than others. It isn’t that they can’t change or they actively resist it. Rather, they experience more fear, more concern and they need more clarity about what the change means to them.
- People who are high on the “S” (process) scale and high on the “C” (quality control, analytics) scale like things to be in order before they will be comfortable making a change. You have to be sure you have laid out specifically what a change means to them and how it impacts their day-to-day.
- Some people will just quietly resist because they want to be team players, don’t want to rock the boat and would not want to be considered as trouble-makers so they won’t say they don’t know something or are confused. Mary is bringing things to your attention for the process overall, and maybe not specific to her.
With all of this said, it seems to make sense to have a sit-down with her. She may not be as resistant as you think. This process and what’s happening might be triggering her behavioral style in ways you — and others — cannot relate to. Ask her what she needs here to be successful. Pay attention to the things she is pointing out that aren’t working well. Stay open and curious about what she sees that you don’t.
It would be a shame to write off a long-term excellent employee because she is struggling with changes, when it might not be the changes themselves. Rather, the way the changes are being communicated and outlined to her could be the issue.
Dear Bev,
We recently completed a client survey, and the results were overall very good. In the responses, 99% said they would refer us and 99% expressed satisfaction. All respondents gave rave reviews on each of our advisors.
However, we did get comments about one of our servicing people, “Lisa,” for whom English is a second language. Clients said things like, “I love Lisa but sometimes I can’t understand when she speaks too quickly.” was Another said, “Lisa answers the phone right away, but sometimes I wish she didn’t, because I have to speak so slowly and clearly to be understood.”
Lisa loves our clients, and she is one of the best workers we have. Everything she does is highly detailed and very high quality. We didn’t interpret these comments to say Lisa shouldn’t work with clients, but my partners are worried this is the underlying statement.
I am worried about an HR issue if I bring up her language barrier (we have no formal HR here). But I also can’t ignore client comments.
T.R.
Dear T.R.,
You are right on both counts, and it is a shame you don’t have a professional to help you navigate this. In fairness to Lisa, I’m going to guess she knows sometimes it is difficult to understand her. I teach graduate classes every semester, and over 60% of my students are international. When they write their papers, they will often comment that English is their second language (or third or fourth in some cases) and they hesitate to speak up in class because they aren’t sure they will be understood. Lisa may speak quickly because she wants to give an answer, but she isn’t confident the client will understand her. It could be nerves, it could be that her first language is one where they speak very quickly, or it could be her behavioral style.
You probably need to sit down and have a heart-to-heart with her. I wouldn’t tell her the clients are complaining per se, but let her know that some of them might struggle to hear and understand her. Ask what kind of support she needs —a class, a speech coach, or simply time to practice speaking clearly with someone. You could record her, and then sit with her to go through the conversation piece by piece and give her feedback.
See if you can collaborate with her to find ways to help her improve. If she loves your clients, she probably loves her job and wants to do the best work possible.
As always, readers, if you have dealt with this issue or have additional ideas, please write in and let me know!
Beverly Flaxington co-founded The Collaborative, a consulting firm devoted to business building for the financial services industry, in 1995. The firm also founded and manages the Advisors Sales Academy. The firm has won the Wealthbriefing WealthTech award for Best Training Solution for 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026. Beverly is currently an adjunct professor at Suffolk University teaching Executive MBA students Leadership and Managing Teams. She is a Certified Professional Behavioral Analyst (CPBA) and Certified Professional Values Analyst (CPVA).
She has spent over 25 years in the investment industry and has been featured in Selling Power Magazine and quoted in hundreds of media outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, MSNBC.com, Investment News and Solutions Magazine for the FPA. She speaks frequently at investment industry conferences and is a speaker for the CFA Institute.
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Advisor Perspectives welcomes guest contributions. The views presented here do not necessarily represent those of Advisor Perspectives.
