As a leader, it is sometimes easy not to detect when those who you are responsible for leading are at “full capacity” – in terms of workload and/ or performance and/ or achievement capability. I am guilty of doing this from time to time, still.
It is so important to understand that the unique characteristics/ traits/ strengths found in us as an individual, are not necessarily present in others – or if they are, then these dimensions may well not be present to the same extent/ level that they are present within ourselves. In short, we’re all delightfully different !
Consequently, particularly where setting standards/ benchmarks are concerned, (as a leader) it is important to recognise when a person is actually (already) performing to the best of their ability – despite what the targeted standards/ benchmarks may be. In short, you must understand when a person you are leading is applying themselves fully to the task at hand – i.e. according to their limitations in terms of capacity, capability and competency most importantly.
At the end of the day every human being on this planet is only capable of “doing their best”, and it is your job as a leader to recognise and acknowledge when a person is in fact “doing their best” – despite what aspirations/ expectations you may have in mind for them. And more than that, you must “accept” when a person is indeed “doing their best”, for no amount of “pushing” on your part is likely to cause any greater/ better performance or achievement to come from them. And as a part of this “acceptance” process, you may just have to re-visit and review your standards and performance benchmarks (e.g. KPI’s) so that they become better (and more realistically) aligned to the actual capacity, capabilities and competencies of the team of people that you are responsible for leading.
If you don’t do this, you run the risk of either losing some of your team and/ or causing certain members of your team to become despondent and feel disenfranchised from your organisation – largely due to them feeling that it is futile for them to try and achieve output expectations that they deem to be beyond their ability to meet.