It is 8 O’Clock on a Friday evening. Karen is still in the office. Staring at the email she composed. She has made at least ten revisions, but she hates each one. She is tired and wants to go home.

The project is not going well… Karen has been trying to get Jacob’s team  team to deliver a critical piece of code that her team needs, but today was the third deadline they missed. Jacob says he cannot commit to a new deadline as his team does not have any more funding.

Karen feels it is time to push that big red “Escalate!” button. But how? She knows that Jacob is equally stretched. She has seen him at work really late and on weekends.  She is worried that if she escalates, Jacob will see her as “that person” at work. Jacob is a good friend and she doesn’t want to get him in trouble. But if she doesn’t escalate, she wouldn’t have an answer when her boss asks her, “Why didn’t you escalate this when you knew that the timelines would slip?”. She closed her eyes and thought for a while…

Have you been in Karen’s situation? Have you wondered what is the right way to escalate without turning into “that person”? If so, read on. 

Ten Tips to Effective Escalations

1	Know when to escalate
	Knowing when to escalate is a learned skill. In order to get better at this, it is important to understand why escalations matter. There are two key objectives behind most escalations: To Inform and to Seek Help. If the issue at hand could lead to a missed deadline or poor deliverable, the senior leadership should know about it sooner than later. The earlier they know about the issue, the more they would be able to help resolve the issue. If you escalate too late, the project may be too far in the red to be salvaged. However, if you escalate too early, you may be seen the person who cries wolf often. There is no silver bullet here. Each situation and company is different. So use your judgement or ask for advice from others within your group.
2	Know who to escalate to
	It is not sufficient to know when to escalate. Knowing who to escalate to is equally critical. Remember that a key objective of an escalation is to seek help. The person who you are escalating the issue to should be able to help with the problem. In the example given above, let us say that Karen believes that the issue can be resolved with additional funding allocated to Jacob’s team. If the funding is managed by the VP of that department, escalating to Jacob’s manager may not produce the required results. However, Karen may want to seek the buy-in from Jacob’s manager first before escalating to the VP, but in that case, she should be clear to Jacob’s manager that this is just an FYI and not the actual escalation.
3	Be clear and specific on what you are asking for
	Many people assume that leaders know what needs to be done when an issue is escalated. However this is not always the case. Many a times,  they are not as much in the weeds as you are and need to be told what they can do to help you.  Be very specific on what you are asking and why. If you need additional resources, state how many and for how long. If you need them to prioritize a task, state what gets impacted because of this. Also be clear on when you need this by. Often escalations are for time-sensitive issues and you don’t want a senior leader sitting on the issue for too long before making a decision. In the example above, Karen can specifically ask for additional budget to be allocated to Jacob’s team to support her project.
5	Escalations are not complaints
	In Karen’s example above, Karen felt that Jacob was putting in all the effort he could and was stretched thin. But what if that wasn’t the case? What if Karen sees him leaving work early almost every day, but is not making any progress on the task? Remember that escalations are not complaints. If you have a complaint against an employee or their behavior, privately communicate that to that employee’s Manager. Escalations should be about the specific issue at hand and how the senior leader can help you get it resolved. Keep your email focussed on the issue and the help needed. The tone of the email is really important here. Is the tone one of complaint (looking back) or one of asking for specific help (looking forward)?
6	Escalations are not rants
	I have seen enough escalations where the person rants for a good part of the email. This is completely unproductive. The objective here is to move forward and get the task done. Ranting doesn’t help anyone and shows you in poor light.
7	CC-ing is not an Escalation
	CC-ing a Senior Leader on the 15th email in a long thread is not an escalation. Most leaders do not have the time to go through a long thread and figure out what is going on and then figure out what you need from them. If you need to copy them on a thread for context, address them in your email and provide a short summary of the problem as well as the specific ask.  However, in the escalation, please state the summary of the issue, the impacts and the help needed
8	Restrict your asks to one person if possible
	An escalation that addresses 5 Directors and 3 VPs is not an escalation, that is a status report. An escalation should contain a specific ask. Preferably to one person so that there is accountability and you can follow-up with that individual / escalate to the next level if required. If you really need multiple senior leaders to do specific things to get the project moving forward (eg. if Karen needed Jacob’s VP to approve the funding and Jacob’s director to reassign priorities), then address each leader separately in the email and make sure that asks from each are clear. If you need multiple leaders to discuss / negotiate and arrive at a consensus, that is not something that can be handled via email. The best course of action would be to send an email providing context and then organize a meeting to facilitate the discussion.
9	Follow-up!
	Sending an escalation email is often not enough. Emails get buried in crowded inboxes. Follow-up! Often a private email / text that says, “I haven’t heard from you on <issue>. It is time sensitive and wanted to make sure it didn’t get buried in your inbox” will get the required attention.
10	Do not escalate when you are angry
	THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT! Do not escalate when you are angry! When you escalate in anger, you will probably complain or rant. Neither of which are productive. It also shows in your language that you are angry and that often provokes a defensive response from people than a problem-solving response. If you are angry, take a break. Step away from the keyboard and take a walk / get a coffee / pet a dog… if you have enough time, sleep on it. Clear your head, and write that email in a calm and composed manner. Remember that this is not a rant, it is not a complaint. It is to inform and seek help.

So what did Karen do? She sought advice from a colleague, got the above tips on escalations done right and got her project back on track by escalating effectively. Jacob was grateful as Karen got him the help he needed without complaining or ranting about him.

Have a story about an escalation done right or have learnings from one that went horribly wrong? Share your own stories via the contact me page here.