Once upon a time, there was a woman named Liz who held an Assistant Manager position in a male-dominated manufacturing operation. She was smart, driven, accomplished, and determined to move up in the corporate ranks of the company. She had a total of 10 direct reports, including a couple of Team Leads, all of whom had been with the company for many years. So, it was reasonable to expect her team to be fairly productive and have created an efficient workflow.
That, however, was not the case. Her team, in fact, was a source of frequent, significant, and significantly frustrating bottlenecks in the organization. While her area was an administrative function, the work she and her team were responsible for actually touched every single employee in the 1,600-employee plant.
Her shortfall was not due to lack of education; she had a Masters’ degree. It wasn’t incompetence; she wouldn’t have been promoted to the AM position had that been the case. She didn’t shirk responsibility. She had a strong drive to win. And she was willing to work whatever long hours were required to get things done. Nor was it because her team was incapable; nearly everyone else in the organization recognized their skills and abilities.
Looking at all the needs, expectations, and variables involved in this scenario one at a time, you would think she had everything she needed, and then some, and would have been moving on up, and quickly.
As I began looking closer, however, I quickly realized what the stumbling block was. She was focused on managing and wasn’t willing to shift into leading.
Strong Leadership Equals…
In my experience, leadership is not limited to persons in specific positions, with titles, authority, and power. Leadership stems from one’s ability to influence others, and that can happen at any level, with any individual, at any time.
Whether you have a position or title, or not, if others are willing to listen to you and give you permission to influence them, then you shift into leading. Conversely, simply because you have a position with a title and inherent authority doesn’t necessarily mean you are a leader. Far too often, in this situation, the people who report to those who rest on position and title are often biding time and offering the bare minimum of effort and expertise in order to get their paycheck.
If that’s what’s going on in your organization, you’re in Trouble (yes – with a capital T!).
Strong leaders begin with a foundation of being able to lead themselves, first. Doing that requires a level of self-awareness that is sadly uncommon today. It also requires strong character, integrity, a willingness to listen, the ability to understand others, and a pervasive desire to continue to learn and grow.
Whether I’m invited in to work with an individual who is pursuing his or her own growth, or I’m invited in by the business to grow leaders as part of a corporate development effort, I always begin at the beginning – raising self-awareness.
Foundational Leadership Characteristics
Self-awareness includes recognition of, understanding of how to direct, and the ability to articulate qualities, characteristics, preferences, styles, strengths, and weaknesses. The next aspect of strong leadership is other-awareness; the ability to observe, understand, respond to, and inspire others. Awareness and a depth of emotional intelligence (EQ) is a natural outcome of these first two pieces of the strong leadership puzzle.
To inspire others, and influence them to get stuff done, strong leaders are able to cast, articulate, and connect others to a compelling vision of the future. Ideally, there is a clear and compelling vision for the overall organization, which is then broken down and refined for each operating unit within the organization, as each department will be responsible for component parts that make up the whole.
Strong leaders are able to articulate this vision in such a way as to connect each team member’s drive, expertise, and role as crucial to the viability of success in the endeavor. After all, if they aren’t important to helping achieve whatever you are striving to create, what’s the point in their being there? Leaders with high EQ are able to recognize what motivates each of their team members and are able to leverage that understanding to draw their team members in.
Finally, strong leaders lead with intention… meaning they have a plan and a purpose and they make decisions and take action based on what is in support of the vision, they reject and release activities and ideas that will only create more work on a path that don’t support the vision, and they are able to adapt to changing conditions and circumstances along the way because they are clear on who they are, what they are striving to achieve, and what is getting in their way.
Managers…
Managers are typically focused on systems, processes, and resources. They tend to be more concerned with following the rules and staying on pre-defined paths, even when they can see the path is taking them farther and farther away from their stated goal or vision.
Managers, in my experience, are not visionary thinkers nor do they dip their toes into the creative-thinking pond. They follow the tried and true, even when those ways are no longer working.
Their self-awareness is often low. They aren’t prone to taking initiative, tending to just do what they are told or guided to do by those in authority above them. And they tend to blame others when things go awry.
As I spent more time with Liz and her team, I quickly began to see where she was getting stuck, and unfortunately, what was going to keep her stuck (she hasn’t yet received the promotion she’s been dreaming of and banking on for more than six years…).
As I said, she was smart, accomplished, educated, and driven, and she was (is) a classic example of “what got you here won’t get you there.” In her rise through the ranks to her AM position, she relied on her own thinking, skills, abilities, and strengths. Those above her saw her potential (and I’ve seen it, too… it does exist), and promoted her hoping she would be able to grow those around her in the same way she had grown herself. The problem was, she couldn’t, wouldn’t, hasn’t, won’t!
Stuck!
All of them, in fact, are stuck, because of her. You see, she’s been so successful as an individual contributor, she’s not taken the time or made the effort to share her expertise, give growth opportunities to her direct reports, and allow them to expand their expertise and experience. She’s too afraid to delegate, as she’s certain none of them will do a task as well as she does. And her fear of what she predetermines will be their inadequate results keeps her from allowing them to even try.
She’s right, you know! How could they build and demonstrate expertise in a task, when they are never given the chance to practice? We all know that the first few times we do any task, we are not instant experts. We stumble along the way; it’s how learning works.
Having measured her strengths, styles, and preferences, she’s hard-wired for Responsibility, Maximizer, Competition, Achiever, Self-Assurance, and Significance (all Clifton StrengthsFinder terms). Essentially, this combination of strengths can prove to be very powerful, indeed, when used to their highest good.
When they’ve been shifted into over-use, however, which is what Liz has done, not only have her strengths become weaknesses, they are proving to be her un-doing, and all jokes aside – make her a prime candidate for some significant health issues if she continues this behavior long-term.
Liz is attempting to manage her team and is creating a lot of distrust and discontent in the process; not to mention a lot of extra work for herself that members of her team really should be doing. She’s not leading; her style is command and control, and there’s not much room to “influence” others when you are dictating and directing.
Everyone Pays When the Manager Refuses to Lead
Her team is uninspired and putting in the minimum just to survive, keep their jobs, and retain their paychecks. They are frustrated that she’s essentially created an obstacle they can’t overcome without demonstrating a willingness to break the accepted chain of movement in their organization and attempt to go around her in order to keep growing themselves.
Her peers and direct manager recognize the jeopardy she is creating for them all. She can’t move up because there isn’t someone prepared to take on her current role, nor is she perceived as being capable of getting more done at a higher level because she insists on doing nearly everything herself.
She personifies the proverbial tale of the person who complains her manager is overloading her with the work of 10 people but won’t delegate any of said work to the 10 people who report to her and are ready, willing, and most likely able to do the job!
Her direct manager is reticent to simply move her out of her role into an individual contributor role, where she would no doubt thrive, because he doesn’t want to embarrass her. And she believes she is being held back because she’s a woman in a man’s world.
As this story unfolds, I imagine you’re likely coming to the same conclusion I’m drawing, which is that the people above her aren’t strong leaders themselves, because a strong, confident leader would take the necessary action to rectify this situation – in a conscientious manner that allows Liz to retain her dignity – and do what’s best for the organization rather than enabling the dysfunction to grow further into the organization.
Leaders, on the Other Hand…
Ideally, leaders are Wide Awake – fully conscious of who they are and what they are about. They are self-aware, other-aware, vision focused, and live and lead with intention.
The most effective, and most fulfilled, leaders I’ve had the pleasure of working with are intimately aware of and can clearly articulate their values, beliefs, styles, preferences, strengths, temperament, and understand the impact of their education, culture, and the life experiences they’ve had that have influenced who they’ve become.
This depth of knowledge serves them well, as they are attuned to these characteristics and are able to recognize them in others. This allows them to discern and understand the same attributes in their leaders, peers, direct reports, suppliers, and customers. Understanding who you’re dealing with gives you the option of adapting your style in any given situation to attain a better outcome.
Don’t misunderstand; I don’t mean to “adopt” another’s style. Truly, you are far more effective and productive being the best version of you possible. Adapting, however, creates space in which others are better able to hear you, understand what you’re working toward, and are more likely to be collaborative in the effort.
The other crucial aspect of this awareness is the development of Emotional Intelligence. It’s a deep and interesting topic all its own, and I’ll spend more time delving into it in a later article. For now, it’s most important that you understand EQ is thekey for long-term, sustainable success in building and maintaining healthy relationships, inspiring collaboration, and leading yourself and others into the future. We used to think IQ was the indicator of future success, and intelligence is important… but if you can’t create and navigate healthy relationships, it’s difficult to build anything of significance.
The Vision Matters
You’ve likely heard the saying that if you have no clear destination in mind, any road will get you there. The same can be said for having a clear vision in your business and for your team. People want to feel that they are part of something bigger than themselves and that what they are working on matters.
At its very essence, every day when you go – or anyone else goes – to work, you are exchanging precious life energy and time for whatever you are doing. These things are perishable; you will never get those moments, hours, days, weeks back! Understanding this imperative should be reinforcement for the need for you, as a Leader in your organization, to craft and share a compelling vision with your people.
Obviously, your business and team need one, as well. After all, if you aren’t striving to create or achieve something more or different than you are today, what’s the point?
A compelling vision statement is always written in present tense, even though it won’t become your reality for some time (at least a year, but probably not more than three years, as the pace of change is ever increasing, and you’ll need to respond to changing conditions and circumstances in your markets). It is stated as if you have already arrived, already created whatever it is… and it needs to be a stretch from where you are today.
The next step is outlining the key milestones or definitive measures that will build toward the overall goal. I recommend no more than 10 and they need to be truly relevant to what you are striving to create.
The next step, as you share this vision with your people, is to paint such a vivid picture for them that they can’t possibly not see it! And as you are doing that, paint each one of them into the picture so each understands the unique role and contribution he or she makes to your team / organization. This requires you to know your people well. And it empowers them to take more initiative and responsibility for your success because they will own it along with you.
Finally, it’s like the old shampoo bottles used to say: Shampoo, rinse, repeat! As a leader, part of your job is to become the Chief Repetition Officer. You will need to keep reminding your people of this vision – in a variety of ways, formats, and through different stories and examples – for some length of time before they actually internalize it.
Clarity Creates the Filter
This is the “leading with intention” part of the work. As you build your team and impart your clear vision to them, you can further strengthen your leadership bench by helping them to understand the Vision is the filter.
Any strategic plan you develop, any decision you make, any crossroads you reach, and any opportunity that presents itself should all be measured against the Vision. If whatever comes up will support you in achieving the vision, the answer is “Yes!” If it doesn’t, no matter how cool, interesting, or compelling it might be, the answer is “No!”
The other piece of living and leading with intention is understanding what you are trying to achieve and being conscientious about how you show up, engage in, and behave in your life and work. It requires thinking ahead about what you might say or do so you have awareness of the potential impact and consequences of your words and actions. If you are thoughtful in these areas, and recognize a need to adapt your style, approach, and language from time-to-time, you are much more likely to create the outcomes you desire.
Shampoo, Rinse, Repeat
The last piece of wisdom I can impart to you today about how to build and strengthen leaders in your organization, moving them far beyond being mere managers, is this: Shampoo, Rinse, Repeat!
What I mean by that is that any kind of growth requires process and application over time. You know as well as I do that you can’t send someone off to a half-, full-, or even multi-day leadership workshop or seminar and expect them to be an amazing leader simply because they went.
It takes practice. It takes reflection on the ideas they’ve been presented with. It requires introspection into their personal styles, preferences, thinking, and blind spots. It requires practice, reflection, fine-tuning, and more practice. And all of this takes time.
I’m not saying those one-time workshops don’t have value; there are almost always some nuggets of wisdom included in the content and exercises. But if there’s no on-going process in place for continued application, reflection, and fine-tuning, your investment will be wasted.
You know that as soon as you, or your team, gets back to the office following the workshop, they will be inundated with everything that happened while they were gone, along with whatever is current in the moment. They will feel too overwhelmed to give themselves the time out to review their notes, reflect, and apply.
It will have been an interesting, and maybe even fun, experience that will produce no lasting change.
Managers to Leaders – The Cliff Notes
Managers manage systems, processes, and resources. Leaders inspire, grow – themselves and others, cast vision, and lead with intention.
The first step is growing one’s self-awareness, which will grow one’s other-awareness (step two). Understanding where the organization is heading and casting a compelling vision is step three. And using steps 1-3 to live and lead with intention, is step four.
It sounds so simple, and it is. But don’t mistake simple with easy. This kind of growth requires time, energy, commitment, application, and persistence. But it’s well worth it. Not only will you be strengthening your team / organization, but you will also be strengthening the families of your employees, and that growth will flow into your community, as well.
When you’re ready to dive in, there’s a compelling free resource for you at www.consciousleadershippartners.com.
_________________
Copyright 2019 Laura Prisc, Conscious Leadership Partners www.consciousleadershippartners.com
Laura Prisc is The Most Trusted Authority on Conscious Leadership; she is a certified Gallup Strengths Coach, certified People Acuity Coach, Gallup-Trained Builder Profile Coach, and a member of the John Maxwell Team.
Begin by Leading Yourself – Cast a Vision for Your Life
Building LeadersAfter I published last week’s article, I received some inquiries from a few people who are not in official leadership positions in their work, but still recognize the need to be theleader in their own lives. I was excited to hear from them, because this is truly where leadership begins. If you can’t effectively lead yourself, how could you possibly lead anyone else?
Foundational Leadership Characteristics
Again, as I’ve shared in other articles on leadership, the building blocks are basic, fundamental, and necessary for any leadership position, whether it’s leading oneself, leading volunteers, leading a team, or leading an entire organization.
Those foundational building blocks are: Self-Awareness,Other-Awareness, Clear Vision, and Living & Leading with Intention. You can refresh your memory on those ideas by reviewing the last article here. Today, I’m going to focus on the Vision portion, as the exercise I take individual coaching clients through is a bit different than what I would use with a leader responsible for a team or an organization.
Designing Your Life
In my work with individual clients, we typically begin our work on a specific challenge or goal the client is focused on, but along the way, our work often shifts to a more holistic approach in which the client decides he or she wants to look at the bigger picture of his or her whole life, not just one piece.
Why think small? After all, if you can design a piece of your life and craft a strategic plan to achieve it, why wouldn’t the same process work for all areas of your life?
First, you’ll need to give yourself permission to imagine, dream, and explore. In fact, I encourage you to speak that permission out loud in a confident tone. While we are all born with insatiable curiosity, vivid imagination, and unbounded creativity, it is often beaten out of us as we grow up and make our way through traditional education systems. This may not happen intentionally – meaning the people around us who do this aren’t likely thinking of what they are doing as intentionally shutting down that side of us – but it happens, nonetheless.
Repeat after me: “I give myself permission to imagine, dream, and explore…to be curious and allow ideas about how I want to live my life to bubble out of me freely and unabridged.”
Reserve the Time
The exercise I’m going to share with you will take some time – 7-14 hours, more or less, depending on how much thought you’ve already given to your vision and how much free reign you allow your imagination. I encourage you to get your calendar out right now and block out the time… and treat these appointments with the same level of importance and commitment you would afford someone you were paying money to see. This is that important!
You’ll want at least an hour for each session, for 7-14 sessions. The difference will depend on if you want to give yourself time to imagine every dayor every other day. The rule of thumb for the exercise is to work through it with at least 24 hours in betweensessions but notmore than 48 hours in between.
The idea here to is to engage your curiosity, imagination, and creativity. It’s not a race or a competition. I actually had one client who was so focused on completing the exercise, she only heard me say how many times she should do the exercise and missed the time interval direction entirely. She very nearly sat down and wrote out her vision 14 times in as short a time span as she could manage, because she was so driven to complete it! Do that and you will miss the point and the magic of this simple exercise altogether!
Choose a time of day when you know you’ll be able to relax and flow through it unhurried. Also, if you’re aware enough of your personal creative rhythms, intentionally choose a time of day when you are more creative. Find a place where you can be comfortable and do the exercise, uninterrupted. Inside, outside, on a bus or a train, in a coffee shop or in your office… There is no one perfect location for every person, but I trust you’ll know yours.
Finally – and this is possibly the only rigid direction I’m going to give you, and it will make the most difference in your experience and outcome: Do NOT do this on any kind of electronic device. Select a nice journal, pick up a blank notebook, use a legal pad… the kind of paper doesn’t actually matter, but it needs to be pen or pencil on paper, written longhand.
Your brain engages and works differently when you put pen to paper, and this will unlock your creativity at higher levels than any keyboard will ever allow.
The Exercise
Take a new journal, notebook, or pad of paper and write out your vision for your life — work, home, family, relationships, free time, exercise, travel, learning, everything— in as much detail as you can.
Write in the present tense, as if it is already your reality… Like this: “I am living in my dream house. It’s a one-level craftsman bungalow with four bedrooms…”
Don’t edit or filter along the way or worry about how someone else might think of it; you don’t have to share it with anyone (and in its early stages, I encourage you not to share it!). Think about the colors, the textures, the sounds, the smells, who is with you…include all of this.
Just write until it’s all out of you. Set it aside for 24 but not more than 48 hours.
Do the exercise, again, but don’t read what you wrote the previous time. Start on a new page. No filtering, no editing…just write it all out.
Do the exercise, again…keep at this process for at least 14 days, or longer if you’re moved to do so.
Don’t worry if what you come up with each time is different than the last time. Just keep writing it out. As you go thru this process, over time, you’ll get more in touch with what you truly long for and will see it more clearly.
Once you know what you desire to create, it’s easier to start taking steps toward it. Know that it’s an iterative process — do this a couple of times a year, or at least once a year, because your needs and desires will change over time. And as you achieve different goals, have experiences, and acquire things along the way, your needs, wants, and desires will change.
Clarity Creates the Filter
This is the “leading with intention” part of leading yourself. Once you’ve articulated what you want to create in your life – at least for this next season – you can move forward with more confidence you’ll actually get to experience it.
“Without vision, the people perish…” This verse from the bible can be interpreted in many ways. For the sake of today’s thoughts, the idea is that with no clear vision for what you want your life to be like, any life will do. No vision allows you to just get up each day and do whatever, repeating those actions and behaviors day after day after day, marking time but not really living. Essentially, you are the walking dead, simply passing the time until you die, and it’s official!
Once you’ve crafted your life vision, you can set about the work of crafting a strategy and action steps to bring it into reality. It’s helpful and powerful to remind yourself of it every day. You may choose to create a vision board with images that spark your thinking, passion, enthusiasm, and energy. Or maybe the words on paper are powerful enough for you.
To really reinforce it and keep your engine stoked, say it out loud every day. Read the words or tell the story from your selected images and allow yourself to be fully in the moment and emotion of how it will feel when you truly are living your dream life and doing your best work.
And remember: Any strategic plan you develop, any decision you make, any crossroads you reach, and any opportunity that presents itself should all be measured against your vision. If whatever comes up will support you in achieving your vision, the answer is “Yes!” If it doesn’t, no matter how cool, interesting, or compelling it might be, the answer is “No!”
Leading Yourself – The Cliff Notes
Regardless of your position, title, responsibility, or authority, at the very foundation of your life is the right and the need to lead yourself. How you do that is entirely up to you. And while others will have the opportunity to influence what happens to you – if you allow them that influence – the choices are really yours to make.
You can’t live the life of your dreams, have the ‘dream job,’ or fully live into any other area of your life if you can’t articulate what those dreams are. This is why having a vision for your life is so important.
I heard someone once say that if you don’t have a vision for your life, other people will plug you into the gaps in their dream wherever they can make you fit… and you’ll spend your life building someone else’s dream. It’s true. Far too many people – and many of them are well-meaning and may even be your loved ones – have ideas about who you should be and what you should be doing with your life.
If you’re not careful and don’t chooseto step up and lead yourself, they’ll have their way. Likely, at some point, you’ll come to some new level of awareness where you snap out of it and think, “This isn’t what I wanted for my life. How did I get here?”You get to that dissatisfied place by going through your life on auto-pilot.
I’m on a mission to awaken you so that’s not your experience.
Wake Up!
Do the Vision Exercise… and do it again, and again, and again!
Then come back and tell me what you’ve discovered.
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Copyright 2019 Laura Prisc, Conscious Leadership Partners www.consciousleadershippartners.com
Laura Prisc is The Most Trusted Authority on Conscious Leadership; she is a certified Gallup Strengths Coach, certified People Acuity Coach, Gallup-Trained Builder Profile Coach, and a member of the John Maxwell Team.
How to Ensure Strong Leadership in Your Business by Thoughtfully Growing Managers into Leaders
Building LeadersOnce upon a time, there was a woman named Liz who held an Assistant Manager position in a male-dominated manufacturing operation. She was smart, driven, accomplished, and determined to move up in the corporate ranks of the company. She had a total of 10 direct reports, including a couple of Team Leads, all of whom had been with the company for many years. So, it was reasonable to expect her team to be fairly productive and have created an efficient workflow.
That, however, was not the case. Her team, in fact, was a source of frequent, significant, and significantly frustrating bottlenecks in the organization. While her area was an administrative function, the work she and her team were responsible for actually touched every single employee in the 1,600-employee plant.
Her shortfall was not due to lack of education; she had a Masters’ degree. It wasn’t incompetence; she wouldn’t have been promoted to the AM position had that been the case. She didn’t shirk responsibility. She had a strong drive to win. And she was willing to work whatever long hours were required to get things done. Nor was it because her team was incapable; nearly everyone else in the organization recognized their skills and abilities.
Looking at all the needs, expectations, and variables involved in this scenario one at a time, you would think she had everything she needed, and then some, and would have been moving on up, and quickly.
As I began looking closer, however, I quickly realized what the stumbling block was. She was focused on managing and wasn’t willing to shift into leading.
Strong Leadership Equals…
In my experience, leadership is not limited to persons in specific positions, with titles, authority, and power. Leadership stems from one’s ability to influence others, and that can happen at any level, with any individual, at any time.
Whether you have a position or title, or not, if others are willing to listen to you and give you permission to influence them, then you shift into leading. Conversely, simply because you have a position with a title and inherent authority doesn’t necessarily mean you are a leader. Far too often, in this situation, the people who report to those who rest on position and title are often biding time and offering the bare minimum of effort and expertise in order to get their paycheck.
If that’s what’s going on in your organization, you’re in Trouble (yes – with a capital T!).
Strong leaders begin with a foundation of being able to lead themselves, first. Doing that requires a level of self-awareness that is sadly uncommon today. It also requires strong character, integrity, a willingness to listen, the ability to understand others, and a pervasive desire to continue to learn and grow.
Whether I’m invited in to work with an individual who is pursuing his or her own growth, or I’m invited in by the business to grow leaders as part of a corporate development effort, I always begin at the beginning – raising self-awareness.
Foundational Leadership Characteristics
Self-awareness includes recognition of, understanding of how to direct, and the ability to articulate qualities, characteristics, preferences, styles, strengths, and weaknesses. The next aspect of strong leadership is other-awareness; the ability to observe, understand, respond to, and inspire others. Awareness and a depth of emotional intelligence (EQ) is a natural outcome of these first two pieces of the strong leadership puzzle.
To inspire others, and influence them to get stuff done, strong leaders are able to cast, articulate, and connect others to a compelling vision of the future. Ideally, there is a clear and compelling vision for the overall organization, which is then broken down and refined for each operating unit within the organization, as each department will be responsible for component parts that make up the whole.
Strong leaders are able to articulate this vision in such a way as to connect each team member’s drive, expertise, and role as crucial to the viability of success in the endeavor. After all, if they aren’t important to helping achieve whatever you are striving to create, what’s the point in their being there? Leaders with high EQ are able to recognize what motivates each of their team members and are able to leverage that understanding to draw their team members in.
Finally, strong leaders lead with intention… meaning they have a plan and a purpose and they make decisions and take action based on what is in support of the vision, they reject and release activities and ideas that will only create more work on a path that don’t support the vision, and they are able to adapt to changing conditions and circumstances along the way because they are clear on who they are, what they are striving to achieve, and what is getting in their way.
Managers…
Managers are typically focused on systems, processes, and resources. They tend to be more concerned with following the rules and staying on pre-defined paths, even when they can see the path is taking them farther and farther away from their stated goal or vision.
Managers, in my experience, are not visionary thinkers nor do they dip their toes into the creative-thinking pond. They follow the tried and true, even when those ways are no longer working.
Their self-awareness is often low. They aren’t prone to taking initiative, tending to just do what they are told or guided to do by those in authority above them. And they tend to blame others when things go awry.
As I spent more time with Liz and her team, I quickly began to see where she was getting stuck, and unfortunately, what was going to keep her stuck (she hasn’t yet received the promotion she’s been dreaming of and banking on for more than six years…).
As I said, she was smart, accomplished, educated, and driven, and she was (is) a classic example of “what got you here won’t get you there.” In her rise through the ranks to her AM position, she relied on her own thinking, skills, abilities, and strengths. Those above her saw her potential (and I’ve seen it, too… it does exist), and promoted her hoping she would be able to grow those around her in the same way she had grown herself. The problem was, she couldn’t, wouldn’t, hasn’t, won’t!
Stuck!
All of them, in fact, are stuck, because of her. You see, she’s been so successful as an individual contributor, she’s not taken the time or made the effort to share her expertise, give growth opportunities to her direct reports, and allow them to expand their expertise and experience. She’s too afraid to delegate, as she’s certain none of them will do a task as well as she does. And her fear of what she predetermines will be their inadequate results keeps her from allowing them to even try.
She’s right, you know! How could they build and demonstrate expertise in a task, when they are never given the chance to practice? We all know that the first few times we do any task, we are not instant experts. We stumble along the way; it’s how learning works.
Having measured her strengths, styles, and preferences, she’s hard-wired for Responsibility, Maximizer, Competition, Achiever, Self-Assurance, and Significance (all Clifton StrengthsFinder terms). Essentially, this combination of strengths can prove to be very powerful, indeed, when used to their highest good.
When they’ve been shifted into over-use, however, which is what Liz has done, not only have her strengths become weaknesses, they are proving to be her un-doing, and all jokes aside – make her a prime candidate for some significant health issues if she continues this behavior long-term.
Liz is attempting to manage her team and is creating a lot of distrust and discontent in the process; not to mention a lot of extra work for herself that members of her team really should be doing. She’s not leading; her style is command and control, and there’s not much room to “influence” others when you are dictating and directing.
Everyone Pays When the Manager Refuses to Lead
Her team is uninspired and putting in the minimum just to survive, keep their jobs, and retain their paychecks. They are frustrated that she’s essentially created an obstacle they can’t overcome without demonstrating a willingness to break the accepted chain of movement in their organization and attempt to go around her in order to keep growing themselves.
Her peers and direct manager recognize the jeopardy she is creating for them all. She can’t move up because there isn’t someone prepared to take on her current role, nor is she perceived as being capable of getting more done at a higher level because she insists on doing nearly everything herself.
She personifies the proverbial tale of the person who complains her manager is overloading her with the work of 10 people but won’t delegate any of said work to the 10 people who report to her and are ready, willing, and most likely able to do the job!
Her direct manager is reticent to simply move her out of her role into an individual contributor role, where she would no doubt thrive, because he doesn’t want to embarrass her. And she believes she is being held back because she’s a woman in a man’s world.
As this story unfolds, I imagine you’re likely coming to the same conclusion I’m drawing, which is that the people above her aren’t strong leaders themselves, because a strong, confident leader would take the necessary action to rectify this situation – in a conscientious manner that allows Liz to retain her dignity – and do what’s best for the organization rather than enabling the dysfunction to grow further into the organization.
Leaders, on the Other Hand…
Ideally, leaders are Wide Awake – fully conscious of who they are and what they are about. They are self-aware, other-aware, vision focused, and live and lead with intention.
The most effective, and most fulfilled, leaders I’ve had the pleasure of working with are intimately aware of and can clearly articulate their values, beliefs, styles, preferences, strengths, temperament, and understand the impact of their education, culture, and the life experiences they’ve had that have influenced who they’ve become.
This depth of knowledge serves them well, as they are attuned to these characteristics and are able to recognize them in others. This allows them to discern and understand the same attributes in their leaders, peers, direct reports, suppliers, and customers. Understanding who you’re dealing with gives you the option of adapting your style in any given situation to attain a better outcome.
Don’t misunderstand; I don’t mean to “adopt” another’s style. Truly, you are far more effective and productive being the best version of you possible. Adapting, however, creates space in which others are better able to hear you, understand what you’re working toward, and are more likely to be collaborative in the effort.
The other crucial aspect of this awareness is the development of Emotional Intelligence. It’s a deep and interesting topic all its own, and I’ll spend more time delving into it in a later article. For now, it’s most important that you understand EQ is thekey for long-term, sustainable success in building and maintaining healthy relationships, inspiring collaboration, and leading yourself and others into the future. We used to think IQ was the indicator of future success, and intelligence is important… but if you can’t create and navigate healthy relationships, it’s difficult to build anything of significance.
The Vision Matters
You’ve likely heard the saying that if you have no clear destination in mind, any road will get you there. The same can be said for having a clear vision in your business and for your team. People want to feel that they are part of something bigger than themselves and that what they are working on matters.
At its very essence, every day when you go – or anyone else goes – to work, you are exchanging precious life energy and time for whatever you are doing. These things are perishable; you will never get those moments, hours, days, weeks back! Understanding this imperative should be reinforcement for the need for you, as a Leader in your organization, to craft and share a compelling vision with your people.
Obviously, your business and team need one, as well. After all, if you aren’t striving to create or achieve something more or different than you are today, what’s the point?
A compelling vision statement is always written in present tense, even though it won’t become your reality for some time (at least a year, but probably not more than three years, as the pace of change is ever increasing, and you’ll need to respond to changing conditions and circumstances in your markets). It is stated as if you have already arrived, already created whatever it is… and it needs to be a stretch from where you are today.
The next step is outlining the key milestones or definitive measures that will build toward the overall goal. I recommend no more than 10 and they need to be truly relevant to what you are striving to create.
The next step, as you share this vision with your people, is to paint such a vivid picture for them that they can’t possibly not see it! And as you are doing that, paint each one of them into the picture so each understands the unique role and contribution he or she makes to your team / organization. This requires you to know your people well. And it empowers them to take more initiative and responsibility for your success because they will own it along with you.
Finally, it’s like the old shampoo bottles used to say: Shampoo, rinse, repeat! As a leader, part of your job is to become the Chief Repetition Officer. You will need to keep reminding your people of this vision – in a variety of ways, formats, and through different stories and examples – for some length of time before they actually internalize it.
Clarity Creates the Filter
This is the “leading with intention” part of the work. As you build your team and impart your clear vision to them, you can further strengthen your leadership bench by helping them to understand the Vision is the filter.
Any strategic plan you develop, any decision you make, any crossroads you reach, and any opportunity that presents itself should all be measured against the Vision. If whatever comes up will support you in achieving the vision, the answer is “Yes!” If it doesn’t, no matter how cool, interesting, or compelling it might be, the answer is “No!”
The other piece of living and leading with intention is understanding what you are trying to achieve and being conscientious about how you show up, engage in, and behave in your life and work. It requires thinking ahead about what you might say or do so you have awareness of the potential impact and consequences of your words and actions. If you are thoughtful in these areas, and recognize a need to adapt your style, approach, and language from time-to-time, you are much more likely to create the outcomes you desire.
Shampoo, Rinse, Repeat
The last piece of wisdom I can impart to you today about how to build and strengthen leaders in your organization, moving them far beyond being mere managers, is this: Shampoo, Rinse, Repeat!
What I mean by that is that any kind of growth requires process and application over time. You know as well as I do that you can’t send someone off to a half-, full-, or even multi-day leadership workshop or seminar and expect them to be an amazing leader simply because they went.
It takes practice. It takes reflection on the ideas they’ve been presented with. It requires introspection into their personal styles, preferences, thinking, and blind spots. It requires practice, reflection, fine-tuning, and more practice. And all of this takes time.
I’m not saying those one-time workshops don’t have value; there are almost always some nuggets of wisdom included in the content and exercises. But if there’s no on-going process in place for continued application, reflection, and fine-tuning, your investment will be wasted.
You know that as soon as you, or your team, gets back to the office following the workshop, they will be inundated with everything that happened while they were gone, along with whatever is current in the moment. They will feel too overwhelmed to give themselves the time out to review their notes, reflect, and apply.
It will have been an interesting, and maybe even fun, experience that will produce no lasting change.
Managers to Leaders – The Cliff Notes
Managers manage systems, processes, and resources. Leaders inspire, grow – themselves and others, cast vision, and lead with intention.
The first step is growing one’s self-awareness, which will grow one’s other-awareness (step two). Understanding where the organization is heading and casting a compelling vision is step three. And using steps 1-3 to live and lead with intention, is step four.
It sounds so simple, and it is. But don’t mistake simple with easy. This kind of growth requires time, energy, commitment, application, and persistence. But it’s well worth it. Not only will you be strengthening your team / organization, but you will also be strengthening the families of your employees, and that growth will flow into your community, as well.
When you’re ready to dive in, there’s a compelling free resource for you at www.consciousleadershippartners.com.
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Copyright 2019 Laura Prisc, Conscious Leadership Partners www.consciousleadershippartners.com
Laura Prisc is The Most Trusted Authority on Conscious Leadership; she is a certified Gallup Strengths Coach, certified People Acuity Coach, Gallup-Trained Builder Profile Coach, and a member of the John Maxwell Team.
Are You Relegating People to Less-Than Status Because You Don’t See Them Fully?
Developing StrengthsThe Lens She Saw Me Through
“You’re just a Kelly girl,”she said.
I can still remember the feeling of that statement. The thoughts that ran through my head and the sensations in my body as her words reverberated through my mind.
“Just a Kelly girl.”
It felt small, dirty, less-than, belittling. It put me in a box that didn’t accurately describe who I was or what I was capable of, nor did it allow for the full expansion of all I had to offer.
You Know the Feeling, Don’t You?
Have you ever experienced that? Has someone in your life – in any area of your life – relegated you to a less-than kind of position or feeling?
I’d be shocked if you said it hasn’t happened; that you haven’t experienced this, yet. I’ve come to understand that it happens far too often; every day, in fact.
The people around us do not see us for who we fully are, nor do their frameworks allow the space for us to fully show up. It happens, sometimes, because of the way we become connected to others, the way we are introduced, and the purpose of what’s going on between us.
It Was Partially True…
In the story I began to tell, I was working as a Communication Manager in a hospital. The woman who spoke those words to me – who labeled me “just a Kelly girl” – was my boss. As belittling as they felt, they were partially true.
I had come to the position I was in through Kelly Employment Services. If you’re not aware of the history, being a “Kelly Girl” was, once upon a time, a most desirable thing to be. Kelly Employment Services had a long history of providing capable, competent, skilled workers (mostly women, at least in the beinning) for temporary assignments in offices across the U.S.
Yes, it was known for providing good secretaries, and eventually expanded into offering other kinds of skilled workers and expertise. And I had been hired by the hospital through Kelly Services on a temporary basis. It was the only way in the door. It was how the job was posted.
I’d been looking for a new position when this one popped up in the local newspaper (Indeed and Monster didn’t yet exist). It was a blind ad, so the only way to apply was through Kelly. It was a relatively common tactic at the time. Employers would hire through agencies on a temp basis in case the person didn’t work out in the first few months, it wouldn’t be complicated to let them go.
So, because I was really interested in the job, I signed on with Kelly Services; it was the one and only job I ever did through them. But my boss didn’t know that. She wasn’t aware of the hospital’s hiring practices or use of Kelly Services to bring people in on a trial basis. She just knew that’s “where I came from” and it became the label she affixed to me. Clearly – based on her words, tone, and actions – this assumption formed her opinion of what I was capable of… and in her mind, it wasn’t much! To say we had a healthy, smooth relationship built on mutual respect would be stretching the truth far too thin!
It Happens Everywhere, Every Day
It continues to happen today, and not just to me.
One of my clients is a very sharp, competent woman with an EMBA from a favorable university and two decades of increasingly responsible work experience in her field of expertise. About 18 months ago, she chose not to continue working in an exceedingly hostile and dysfunctional team, but still needed to work. Because of her family situation, she chose to look for opportunities in and around the community in which they lived, as relocating wasn’t a good option.
She had formed what she thought was a healthy, positive relationship with a leader in a related area of the organization, and when he learned she was available he offered her a position. As it turned out, he was in transition also, moving into a new initiative that wasn’t yet fully established, had a limited budget, and no support staff.
His strengths do not fall on the organizational, structural, focused planning end of the spectrum. Hers do. And because she thought she was demonstrating a willingness to pitch in and do whatever it took to make this new program not only viable but highly successful, she did something that was easy for her. She created structure in the office and in the program.
Having been used to having an executive assistant in his former role, he was thrilled when she started handling a lot of those tasks for him. It may have been a fatal error in judgment – for both of them, but for different reasons.
While she has considerably more to offer in terms of strategic thinking, relationship building, and program management, she established a pattern of willingly and cheerfully (at least in the beginning) handling all the more pedestrian tasks that always need to be handled in any office. He, finding those tasks tedious, and perhaps even beneath him, has gladly taken advantage of her excellent skills. And because they are the only two people on the team, there is no one else available to delegate those tasks to.
Unfortunately, it appears to have limited what he believes she is actually capable of and he has quit involving her in anything more meaningful in the work of the program. She, in turn, has become increasingly frustrated and less engaged in her work. She knows she’s capable of offering significantly more than he seems willing to see or allow.
Why Does It Happen?
Over the course of the 25+ years I’ve been working, I’ve come to realize that each of us views the world through a singularly unique lens and it’s comprised of several often-unrecognized facets of who we become over the course of our lives. When we walk through life on auto-pilot, it’s easy to fall into patterns of thinking and behavior that put very limited views on people, situations, and experiences.
Here’s another example. I have two businesses. One of them is a creative off-site meeting space where teams, Boards, and organizations can come to hold strategic planning, training, project kick-offs, team building, and numerous other kinds of meetings or workshops. I sometimes use it for work as part of my primary business as an Executive Coach, Teacher, and Facilitator, bringing clients in for coaching, training, and some of the other work I do.
When I staff the space, meaning there are client organizations who want to use one of the rooms for their meeting or event, but don’t need my unique expertise, I am there in a Customer Service capacity only. I ensure their room is set up appropriately, they have everything they need for a successful meeting, help the caterer set up when he/she brings in lunch, and thank them for their business on their way out at the end of the day.
If this is the only capacity in which they ever interact with me, it’s easy for them to put me in that Customer Service box, without any concept that I’m capable of serving them in much more meaningful and significant ways. It’s not likely they’ll hire me as a Coach or Facilitator; that work doesn’t fit that box.
If they see me somewhere else, demonstrating my Coaching, Teaching, Speaking, or Facilitating expertise, they may be surprised to find me staffing my meeting space when they show up for a meeting… because being the Customer Service person doesn’t fit the Executive Coach box.
In either situation, I think the potential for us both to miss out is high. And I suspect there are areas of your work and personal life that are creating the same kind of artificial and unfortunate limitations.
Fitting People into the Gaps
During my 25+ years in business, I’ve seen far too many managers and leaders fill the gaps in their organizations with people who are not the right fit for the new role, simply because it was fast, felt easy, and was convenient. Rarely does it work well.
I don’t think it’s driven by malicious intent, rather expediency or the false assumption that it’s efficient and cost effective. What happens most often, in fact, is that people are moved into roles – or given additional responsibilities – for which they are partially qualified, but not really gifted in or excited about. Perhaps team members acquiesce because they fear losing their job or status in the company. Maybe they agree because they don’t really know what their perfect role is, yet, and they think it’s a good plan to take on whatever comes their way and try it on for size.
Managers may do it because a particular person appears to adapt well, be willing to take on any task they are given and can do at least a passable job. The reasons on both sides of the equation are many and often convoluted.
In the long run, I don’t believe this is a sound strategy. Similar to the Peter Principal, which says that people rise to the level of their incompetency, I think sometimes they move sideways to the level of their incompetency, as well. And then a common, but wrong, assumption is made: Because they are now underperforming in the new role, or don’t have a highly motivated attitude about the new work they’ve taken on, maybe they aren’t as skilled and competent and valuable as they were thought to be previously.
What I know for sure
Every single one of us is hard-wired for specific styles, preferences, skills, and talents. Simply because this is so, doesn’t mean we automatically recognize, understand, or develop all of them to use them intentionally. In addition, many roles we take on don’t require us – or maybe provide opportunity for us – to demonstrate all of our strengths, so some will remain hidden. And if others can’t see them or don’t experience them, it’s easy to dismiss the possibility they exist.
Which creates the perfect environment for us to conclude the people around us are capable of less than what is their true ability to create and serve. This is all the more reason to create time and space to get to know the people around you – be they co-workers, friends, neighbors, and even family members – at a deeper level… to discover what ignites their soul, what kinds of activities spark their curiosity and creativity… to ask what they are interested in learning about or trying next.
In a way, it’s a succession-planning exercise, but not restricted to filling only key leadership roles. And while it’s time-consuming, meaning you have to slow down to have a meaningful conversation, it will serve you well in the long-term, as you’ll have more engaged people on your team when they discover you are actually interested in who they are and what they get excited about. You’ll have greater success when you “fill gaps,” as you’ll be able to create a better fit when you do it intentionally and in an informed way.
You’ll discover strengths, skills, talents, and interests in people you would have never imagined were there, and that higher level of engagement pays tremendous dividends in numerous ways over time, not the least of which are absenteeism, morale, recruiting & retention, waste, turnover, and so many more.
Who Are You Not Seeing Clearly?
With this in mind, I offer you a challenge. Over the next week, I encourage you to look more closely at the people around you, whether it’s at work, at home, or when you’re out in the community. Get curious. Actively wonder what hidden talents they might be holding and imagine how your work and the world might be a different, better, place if those talents were unlocked and unleashed.
Take the next step and engage in the conversation, again from a base of curiosity. Seek first to understand and ask the kinds of questions that will draw people into a meaningful conversation about what they long to create in the world and how you can support it.
Then, take a minute and leave a comment to share what you’ve discovered.