Hard decisions are hard. Most of us nod along when we hear that, right up until one of those decisions lands on us. A layoff. A budget cut. A change in direction that seems to come out of nowhere. In that moment, grace is rarely our first instinct.
Here’s the thing. We don’t hold leaders to exactly the same standard we hold everyone else, and I don’t think we should. The further up you go, the heavier the responsibility and the harder the decisions. It’s impossible to make those decisions and please everyone. Some will cause real harm, like having to lay people off, and many will simply leave people feeling unhappy or unheard. That’s why the old saying goes, “You make the big bucks to make the hard decisions.”
And yet we rarely extend much grace to leadership until we’re sitting in the chair ourselves. It’s a lot like the way some of us can disagree with homosexuality, right up until someone we love and care about, like a son or a daughter, comes out, and suddenly we have a different perspective. Leadership works the same way. We don’t have grace for leadership until we’re in a position of leadership and realize, “Oh crap, that’s what it looks like from here.” Suddenly the leader’s behavior makes more sense. How else would you have done it?
That’s a real opportunity for the people on the receiving end. You can disagree with a decision, even feel a little put off by how things are going, and still recognize that hard decisions are hard. Extending that grace doesn’t mean you stop speaking up. It means you assume the person making the call is carrying something you can’t fully see.
But let me be clear about what grace upward is not. Grace doesn’t exonerate the leader. Leaders are still responsible for knowing the impact they’re having on the people below them: whether their team feels safe, on edge, unsure what to expect, or blamed for things that started with unclear expectations. Two things are true: we can hold leadership accountable to certain standards without shaming them for their missteps.
So here’s a question for both sides of the desk. If you’re on the receiving end, what might this decision look like from the seat of the person who made it? And if you’re making the call, what is it costing the people who have to live with it, and what are you doing to make that cost visible and bearable?
Grace and accountability aren’t opposites. The healthiest cultures have plenty of both.
If you’re wrestling with a hard call, or on a team trying to make sense of one, I’d love to be a thought partner.
