Heavy Burdens: Should, Always, Must, and Never

We all carry around a heavy burden of over-generalized rules: I must always do this, I must never do that. I first learned of these rules from the work of Virginia Satir, who called them "survival rules." Rules usually have relevance and value, but in their over-generalized forms, they limit our choices and lead us into trouble.

An example: "An effective leader must always communicate and provide leadership and motivation." While a laudable goal, it isn't always possible. For instance, you might be directed to withhold certain information, or you might have an employee or two who are so distracted by problems at home that they cannot be motivated — by anyone.

Anyone who believes that an effective leader must always communicate, lead, and motivate, risks feeling bad most of the time, because the standard is so often unachievable.

Our example has the form "I must always X," but rules can take other forms: "I must never X," "I should X," "I should always X," and so on. Their unforgiving language leads to trouble: if you violate X, you're not an effective leader. Life is not like that — there are always circumstances. Sometimes those circumstances provide good reason for not "meeting the standard," but the rules make no allowances for Life.

We all carry around
rules that limit our choices
and lead us into troubleTo see the impossibility of adhering to these rules, apply a simple test. Certainly if you must do something, you can do it, so if you change must to can, the statement should be true. If it isn't, you have an impossible rule. Our example becomes "An effective leader can always communicate and provide leadership and motivation." Laughably impossible.

Because of our rules, we can feel guilty when we're innocent. And because of our rules, we have "buttons" that other people can push. Fortunately, Virginia Satir has given us a way to shed the burden that rules impose. She called it Rule Transformation.

Rule transformations have two steps. You first change the rule to a guideline, and then you add conditions for its application. In our example, we change "must always" to "can sometimes" to make it a guideline, and then we add some conditions:

An effective leader can sometimes communicate and provide leadership and motivation, when communication is appropriate, when people are able to accept leadership, and when they can be motivated.

This form removes much of the unbearable burden from the leader, and acknowledges that other people have roles to play, too.

What are your rules? To find some examples, saddle up your favorite search engine and search for "an effective leader should," "an effective leader must," "leaders must never," "the best leaders always," and so on.

See how many of the rules you find are rules you carry around with you every day. When you find one, transform it. You will have set down a heavy burden.  Top    Next Issue

The article you've been reading is an archived issue of Point Lookout, my weekly newsletter. I've been publishing it since January, 2001, free to all subscribers, over the Web, and via RSS. You can help keep it free by donating either as an individual or as an organization. You'll receive in return my sincere thanks — and the comfort of knowing that you've helped to propagate insights and perspectives that can help make our workplaces a little more human-friendly. More

Your comments are welcome

About Point Lookout

Thank you for reading this article. I hope you enjoyed it and found it useful, and that you'll consider recommending it to a friend.

Point Lookout is a free weekly email newsletter. Browse the archive of past issues. Subscribe for free.

Support Point Lookout by joining the Friends of Point Lookout, as an individual or as an organization.

Do you face a complex interpersonal situation? Send it in, anonymously if you like, and I'll give you my two cents.

Related articles

More articles on Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness:

Should I Keep Bailing or Start Plugging the Leaks?

When we're flooded with problems, and the rowboat is taking on water, we tend to bail with buckets, rather than take time out to plug the leaks. Here are some tips for dealing with floods of problems.

Let Me Finish, Please

We use meetings to exchange information and to explore complex issues. In open discussion, we tend to interrupt each other. Interruptions can be disruptive, distracting, funny, essential, and frustratingly common. What can we do to limit interruptions without depriving ourselves of their benefits?

Shooting Ourselves in the Feet

When you give a demo to a small audience, there's a danger of overwhelming them in a behavior I call "swarming." Here are some tips for terrific demos to small audiences.

Workplace Anti-Patterns

We find patterns of counter-effective behavior — anti-patterns — in every part of life, including the workplace. Why? What are their features?

Meeting Troubles: Culture

Sometimes meetings are less effective than they might be because of cultural factors that are outside our awareness. Here are some examples.

See also Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness for more related articles.

Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout

Coming October 27: Five Guidelines for Choices

Each day we make dozens or hundreds of choices — maybe more. We make many of those choices outside our awareness. But we can make better choices if we can recognize choice patterns that often lead to trouble. Here are five guidelines for making choices. Available here and by RSS on October 27.

And on November 3: Way Over Their Heads

For organizations in crisis, some but not all their people understand the situation. Toxic conflict can erupt between those who grasp the problem's severity and those who don't. Trying to resolve the conflict by educating one's opponents rarely works. There are alternatives. Available here and by RSS on November 3.

Coaching services

I offer email and telephone coaching at both corporate and individual rates. Contact Rick for details at rbrenEQuetChPjwYBDxmgner@ChacxXTxBssoFmfDfMugoCanyon.com or (650) 787-6475, or toll-free in the continental US at (866) 378-5470.

Get the ebook!

Past issues of Point Lookout are available in six ebooks:

• Get 2001-2 in Geese Don't Land on Twigs (PDF, )
• Get 2003-4 in Why Dogs Wag (PDF, )
• Get 2005-6 in Loopy Things We Do (PDF, )
• Get 2007-8 in Things We Believe That Maybe Aren't So True (PDF, )
• Get 2009-10 in The Questions Not Asked (PDF, )
• Get all of the first twelve years (2001-2012) in The Collected Issues of Point Lookout (PDF, )

Are you a writer, editor or publisher on deadline? Are you looking for an article that will get people talking and get compliments flying your way? You can have 500-1000 words in your inbox in one hour. License any article from this Web site. More info

Public seminars

The Power Affect: How We Express Our Personal Power

Many people who possess real organizational power have a characteristic demeanor. It's the way they project their presence. I call this the power affect. Some people — call them power pretenders — adopt the power affect well before they attain significant organizational power. Unfortunately for their colleagues, and for their organizations, power pretenders can attain organizational power out of proportion to their merit or abilities. Understanding the power affect is therefore important for anyone who aims to attain power, or anyone who works with power pretenders. Read more about this program.

• A recording of a program presented June 29, 2017, Monthly Webinar, sponsored by Technobility Webinar Series. PMI members can earn 1.0 Category 'A' PDU by viewing this program. View this program now.
   
• A recording of a program presented June 29, 2017, Monthly Webinar, sponsored by Technobility Webinar Series. PMI members can earn 1.0 Category 'A' PDU by viewing this program. View this program now.
   

Bullet Points: Mastery or Madness?

Decision makers in modern organizations commonly demand briefings in the form of bullet points or a series of series of bullet points. But this form of presentation has limited value for complex decisions. We need something more. We actually need to think. Briefers who combine the bullet-point format with a variety of persuasion techniques can mislead decision makers, guiding them into making poor decisions. Read more about this program.

• A recording of a program presented June 24, 2020, Monthly Webinar, sponsored by Technobility Webinar Series. PMI members can earn 1.0 Category 'A' PDU by viewing this program. View this program now.
   
• A recording of a program presented June 24, 2020, Monthly Webinar, sponsored by Technobility Webinar Series. PMI members can earn 1.0 Category 'A' PDU by viewing this program. View this program now.