My brother stopped by while we were playing with our then four-month-old Alaskan Malamute puppy Clara. After he heard me tell her “Stop biting”, “quit jumping”, “don’t pull so hard”, etc., his response was “Too many rules!” I hadn’t thought about it before he said that, but when you are raising a puppy, there has to be a lot of rules, especially when they are between eight and sixteen weeks old, when they are very impressionable. For example, they need to have rules about where they are to go to the bathroom (and where they aren’t), what rooms of the house they can go into, etc.
But at work when you are leading your team, after you communicate your expectations, you don’t need many rules. Continue reading →