When someone is struggling at work, our first instinct is to step in, give advice, or provide a few helpful suggestions.
When we know the answer, it is natural to want to share it. Yet sometimes the most well-intentioned ‘advice’ is the very thing standing between someone and their breakthrough. The struggle is what provides the necessary catalyst for growth.
Michael Thomas, an Executive Coach and Learning Development Strategist (LinkedIn), saw this play out in the most unexpected place. Not in a boardroom or a one-on-one session, but on a neighborhood street.
What Michael describes in a neighbor’s driveway is something most of us do every single day at work, without even realizing it.
Here is Michael’s story, as he told it.
I was outside and noticed my neighbor working with his young son on how to ride his bike without training wheels. Something almost every parent knows all too well. What starts with excitement and anticipation quickly turns into fear and frustration.
At first, the boy was all smiles.
Then came a wobble.
Then came the doubt.
The inevitable fall.
Then the frustration.
Like any good parent, the dad leaned in. He coached, corrected, and offered advice, all in the spirit of helping.
What I noticed was that the more he talked, the less the boy tried.
It’s not always easy stepping into someone else’s moment, so I hesitated before I asked my buddy if I could try something I’ve used before.
He kind of laughed and said, “I’ll take anything right now.”
I turned to the boy and asked, “Why do you want to learn how to ride your bike?”
He said, “My brother can do it, and my friend can too.”
We talked for a minute, not about how to ride, but about what he already knew. The pedals. The handlebars. The tires. Together we discovered, “The only thing missing are the training wheels. Everything else is the same.”
Then I said, “OK, let’s see what you can do.”
He walked his bike back up the small hill and got on. When he started coming down, he was awkward and a little wobbly, but he was moving.
He made it about 20 feet before nervously putting his feet down. His feet hit the ground a little hard, and he looked back at his dad. “See… I can’t.”
I smiled. “You just did more than you think. What worked there?”
He paused and said, “I stayed on longer.”
“Exactly. What else?”
“I didn’t fall.”
Now we were getting somewhere. Instead of giving him a list of instructions, we just focused on one small thing to try. He said he would keep his head up and not look down.
That was it.
He went back up the hill. This time, he had more control and a little more confidence.
Twenty feet turned into halfway. Halfway turned into almost the whole way. And then he made it all the way down. No one is holding the bike. No one is telling him what to do. It was all him.
I looked over at his dad and could see relief, pride, and maybe a little realization.
Like so many of us, he wasn’t doing anything wrong. He was doing what he thought would help.
Telling. Showing. Correcting.
His son didn’t need more instruction. He needed a little space to think, to try, to figure it out.
What We Can Learn from a Well-Intentioned Dad
The best coaches are not the ones with the most to say or the greatest advice.
Whether it’s a kid on a bike or someone navigating a hard project at work, people grow when they are given the room to think, try, and own their own progress. The questions you ask as a leader will almost always outlast the instructions you give.
Next time someone on your team is struggling, before jumping in with the solution, try asking what’s already working. Identify where they are getting stuck and what they might do differently.
You might be surprised by what they figure out on their own.
