Unsaid Expectations

Unsaid expectations are a preview of future resentments and once you see it, you can’t unsee it. We start with that simple line and trace how it shows up everywhere: leadership, teamwork, families, friendships, and even the way we argue when we feel wronged. When we expect people to read our minds, we set them up to fail and we set ourselves up to stay mad. 

We talk through why setting expectations is so hard for some leaders, from being “busy being busy” to making giant assumptions that other people will reach the same logical conclusion we do. Then we get concrete: what happens when a leader says “I just want my people to be professional” without defining what that means? One person’s definition is not another’s, and a single detail (like tennis shoes) can reveal how different the standards really are. We also explore how slippery big words can be, including ethics, and why shared definitions matter even more as workplaces navigate topics like the ethical use of AI. 

Scott adds some perspective by sharing a story about a teen driver, a late night, and realizing the real problem wasn’t the kid, it was the missing expectation. We close with practical leadership tools: ask “help me understand” before you assume bad intent, use the mirror test when you’re angry, calm down, and walk into the conversation to resolve the issue rather than win. If this helped you, subscribe, share it with a leader or teammate.

Transcript

Karman 0:00

Good morning, Scott and Tandy. Good morning, Karman.

Scott 0:05

Hello, Karman.

Karman 0:08

You sound so debonair this morning, Scott.

Scott 0:12

Is that are you sure that's the word you want to use?

Karman 0:16

Or persuasive? I think it's the perfect word, but I don't know how to spell it. So sometimes I know how to spell it.

Scott 0:26

Come on, Karman.

Karman 0:27

H-A-N-D-S-O-M.

Scott 0:29

I

Warm Banter And Wordplay

Scott 0:30

T. How else would you spell it?

Tammy 0:32

It. It You're such a smart ass. Did you not see that one coming? I did not see that one.

Scott 0:37

Well, the next time someone says how do you spell it? You say IT, how do you spell it? Idiot.

Karman 0:44

So I saw this t-shirt the other day that stuck with me on a bunch of levels. It said unsaid expectations are a preview of future resentments. Unsaid expectations are a preview of future resentments.

Tammy 1:04

That's very deep for a t-shirt.

Scott 1:08

Unsaid expectations.

Karman 1:10

The things that I expect and don't tell you

Unsaid Expectations Create Resentment

Karman 1:14

are the things that piss me off later. And I'm resentful about that you didn't just understand that this was my expectation.

Scott 1:25

Sure, sure, sure. Read my mind.

Karman 1:28

Yeah, right. Read my mind. So my question for you guys is about setting expectations. This is a thing that we talk about a lot in leadership classes that become more. Why is setting expectations so hard for some leaders?

Scott 1:46

You know, honestly, it's probably an ID 10 T error.

Karman 1:50

Of course, know what those words mean, Scott.

Scott 1:54

And just get out a piece of paper and a writing utensil and write ID and the number 10 and a T. That is the problem that you have. Okay. And Karman's writing it right down right now. And then she's gonna chuckle here in just a second. ID, the number 10, the number zero. Number 10, 10, and T. Um, yeah, got it.

unknown 2:17

Thank you.

Tammy 2:18

I'm a little slow early this morning. Again, this is a different generation, right? This is something that um some of us at a little older age actually get because that actually something that was there.

Scott 2:33

Yes, yeah.

Tammy 2:35

Somebody was very clever back when they were writing code years ago.

Scott 2:39

Yes, yeah. It's one of my favorite help desk responses. Uh why why was that problem? ID 10 tier. Karman, I think it's if I step back and I say and I ask myself, what prevents expectations from like being put out there? Okay, so I think, okay, one reason is we're so busy being busy, right? We're running from one meeting to the next or the next to the next. And we're not spending time being purposeful to say, hey Karman, or hey, Tammy, or hey, Francesca, hey, we need this, and here's what good looks like. I think it's also we make giant assumptions about people.

Tammy 3:23

To me, that's the big one, right? That we make it's jumping Julia. We make these

Why Leaders Skip Clarity

Tammy 3:29

big, huge assumptions that what our logical conclusion is is gonna be their logical conclusion. The way that we see something is how they're going to see it. And we see this constantly, right, in organizations. People will say things like, and I'm just gonna use a really typical one, okay? You know, I want my people to be professional. Now, when somebody says that, they have a whole thing in their head, right? What professionalism looks like. And I was doing a workshop recently, and somebody said, Yeah, I just want my people to be professional. And so I just had people write down on a piece of paper what is professionalism, and everybody kind of wrote down their piece on

Defining Professional Before Judging

Tammy 4:17

a piece of paper. And they got done, and I said, Okay, I have a question for you. I'm up here in tennis shoes. Am I professional according to your list? And this one lady raises her hand in the group and she said, No, professionals don't wear tennis shoes. And the whole room gasped. And I was like, There's your there's your lesson, right? Okay. A lot of you are gonna say, Hey, tennis shoes, no big deal. This person is saying, uh-uh, never professionals never wear tennis shoes. But how am I supposed to know that if you don't tell me? Because the word professional means something different to me than it might mean to you.

Scott 4:56

And so it's it's this have I provided context around these definitions? What does professional mean? What does nice mean? Actually, I was having an amazing conversation with one of our new staff members, and they shared that. Well, now I'll embarrass myself because I can't remember if it was a friend or a cousin. Someone is writing a dissertation or a thesis about the ethical use of AI. And I said, Oh, that's interesting. What is their what is what are they basing their ethics on? And we had

Shared Meaning And Ethics Example

Scott 5:26

a conversation, and I said, Have you ever looked up the definition of ethics? No, and so she looked it up, and it points to moral, right? And if you look up the definition of those two, it is basically saying the definition of ethics is whatever a group of people agree on. So if the three of us say, hey, killing people is ethical, killing people is now ethical to our group. Well, think about it for just a minute. So you think so you think about people throw out these words, yeah, and we assume that everyone has a shared definition of that.

Tammy 6:06

Seldom do we, and that's that piece. Our definition, however, we came up to that piece, right? It's it's almost like those words have meanings to us, but we don't think about the meaning of those words. It's like we're breathing, we don't think about breathing, right? I'm gonna use this word, I don't think about what that word means, but I assume that my definition of it is exactly the same as the people that I'm talking with. And the fact of the matter is it is radically different, right? And that's where we get in trouble, is we're like, come on, it's obvious, obvious to you, okay, but it is not the same obvious as if somebody else, because they're also going to say it's obvious, okay, and come to completely different conclusions.

Scott 6:55

And what for me, what it reminds me of is I mean, I think of the book Leadership and Self-Deception, probably one of my all-time favorite books. And I can remember our oldest son had his license. First time he took the car, it was a weekend, and he went out for a drive and he was out with his friends, and we were in living in the Des Moines area at that time, and you know, it's 11:30, not home, not a big deal. It's a Friday, I'm not so

A Curfew Story That Changes Everything

Scott 7:25

worried. 12, 12:31. He's not answering texts, he's not answering phone calls. Of course, we're thinking all positive things at that moment, okay, all positive things, and he's out feeding the homeless, for sure, yeah, absolutely. And he comes in at I it was like 1:45, 2 a.m., and I'm fuming mad. And then what I realized was Beth and I have never set an expectation about what time to be home. And when we call, like as soon as it is safe and reasonable, you need to you need to respond. And so at that moment, I like went from you know, I was ready to kill him to damn it, that's my fault. And I just looked at him, I said, Hey man, nothing good happens after this time. So during the week, when you have school, you need to be home by this time and on the weekends this time. And when mom and I call or text, when it is, you know, safe and appropriate, of course, not when you're driving, then you just need to let us know that everything's okay or just respond. From that moment, never had a problem. If he was going to be late, he would say, Hey, like traffic is bad, and you know, you know, 10 minutes late, 15 minutes, like whatever. And we had just never set that expectation. Now, had I gone ballistic, would I have resolved it? It's exactly your comment at the beginning of the podcast, Tarmin. Unstated expectations pisses me off later. I didn't say it as eloquent as you.

Tammy 9:01

But it's totally true in this particular spot, and so many disagreements can be resolved simply by having these conversations. So, hey, families, two families getting together and going on vacation, expectations. Are we gonna eat every meal together? Are we gonna go on every activity together? Are we gonna have go do your thing during the day and then at night let's meet and talk about what we did, right? If

Preventing Conflict At Work And Home

Tammy 9:31

we simply talk, we can actually resolve those things and not be resentful because we think that they're gonna do what we want them to do, and then they don't, and our feelings get hurt, and then we start thinking they did it purposefully. What is their reason, their motivations for that? And it usually is again not something positive. Oh, their motivation was they wanted to, you know, fill in the blank. Well, it's actually something against us, and and usually, right?

Scott 9:59

You're looking at that, you're saying, Oh, they're lazy, they're stupid, they don't care, they're taking advantage.

Tammy 10:04

That might be true, it's likely not correct, and so that's that piece where that we have that rub because we haven't stated ahead of time. Now, even if they hadn't stated ahead of time, you can say, help me understand before you get all mad, help me understand. Ask them what their motivations are, and it usually resolves that thing too, if you believe them. Okay, in that spot. I love this piece in terms of do you get resentful later? Every time you don't have a conversation, either ahead of time or afterwards, resentment is usually the cost, and resentment that builds up gets to a place where you cannot get past it, right? This is what my family's been dealing with since the death of my my parents. There is resentment that I can't see us ever getting through, and that is sad. And that's why a lot of people break up with the companies that they're working with, with neighbors, with family, with friends, right? Because we actually don't have these conversations, and the conversations are a whole lot better than being on the other side and saying, I can never repair that. It's over.

Scott 11:22

What I keep thinking about is if you've ever been in a leadership class with me, I will tell people frequently if you're mad, the first thing you need to do is go to a mirror and look in the mirror and be mad at yourself because probably you should have taken action earlier. You haven't done the work you need to do as a leader. And if you're mad, be mad at yourself. Then go have a conversation to set expectations or hold them accountable or whatever

Mirror Test Then Calm Conversation

Scott 11:52

needs to be done. But more than likely, if you if you are honest with yourself, you probably haven't addressed something as early as you should have.

Tammy 12:02

And this part, Scott, is hysterical because we actually have watched people like they go off. It's usually they're mad at themselves, but they don't want to say that or they're not realizing it. Okay. Later on, they'll realize it. So I love that. Go look in the mirror, okay? And then hit the pause button. Get over your mad because it doesn't do you any good to be mad and go into that next conversation. So hold yourself accountable first and then calm down and then resolve it. Don't go beat him with a bat. Someone in class this week said, Hey, I'm I need a stick. And I like said, What other options do you have? And they said they went, a bigger stick. It is an option, it's for sure an option.

Karman 12:51

So Scott was in your class.

Tammy 12:55

He was not. It was a baby, it was a baby version of Scott, that's for sure.

Scott 13:02

I wouldn't have said a bigger stick, Karman. I would have said an axe. Because if the stick doesn't work, a bigger stick isn't going to, which means it's you know a better tool.

Tammy 13:12

I need a better tool. Sharper. But that's the piece, right? If your reaction to all of this is to always get big, right? And try to say, I'm gonna win the fight, one of the pieces in there is that that also means you're not going in to resolve the issue, you're going in to like dominate the individual. And that's the other part that we see all the time. When you have not done your work, oftentimes the reaction is to dominate, and that's

Resolve The Issue Not Win

Tammy 13:46

coming from resentment, anger, those negative emotions in that particular spot. And I do think that that's one of the things. Look at yourself and then calm down and then resolve the issue, not try to win. Two very different perspectives.