In a previous Lessons on the Journey to Leadership article, we discussed one of the most important lessons that I have had to learn over the past decade as a leader for my organization. That is, to be an effective leader, you must continually focus on creating a reality where you can maximize the time spent on your most important work. Often times, the greatest challenge with this lies in mindset. The fear of letting go leads many leaders to focus their time and resources on work that doesn’t contribute to the organization’s overall success, and most likely could be completed by someone else on their team.
Unfortunately, creating a reality that enables us to work on our business, rather than in it, is something that cannot be done just once and never thought about again. There will inevitably be changes and roadblocks that arise that make this reality difficult to maintain. So, what can we do to set ourselves up for the best chance at success? We can shift our mindset.
The paradigm shift that occurs when you go from being a high level contributor to a manager or leader can be difficult to process. You are now no longer rewarded for the same reasons that got you to the point you are now. This challenge is one that plagues most high achievers at some point in their professional lives and to some degree their personal lives.
Most people start their professional careers as individual contributors, where their personal work is evaluated and graded. From that work, a determination is made on their promotability based on sustained excellence and their ability to meet and achieve expectations. However, at some point everyone reaches a chasm of professional growth in which they are forced to take the next step in order to continue growing professionally. This means they go from being a doer, being valued based on their own work, to a manager that is graded on their team’s ability to be successful.
While most people are eager to make this jump, knowing that it’s oftentimes required in order to continue their professional journey, they very seldom take the time to reflect on what making this transition means for what they are doing and how they are doing it. This transition may seem easy at a glance because you’re no longer required to do nearly the same amount of work yourself, but instead spend a great deal of time working with your team to help them meet their goals and expectations.
This lack of reflection and objective assessment leads many new managers and leaders down the wrong path. Oftentimes, they become micro managers or people who take over work from their direct reports, thinking that they can do it quicker and better. Unfortunately, they don’t pause to see how this might be harmful for their team’s professional growth, development, and long term success. And while, yes, the short term outcomes might be better, they end up limiting their ability to continue their own professional growth, while at the same time negatively impacting their personal lives, as well as the lives of their direct reports.
To avoid falling into this reality, new leaders must have a meaningful reflection and understanding of what their most important work truly is. They need to evaluate what work will have the biggest impact on overall success and how they can/should be supporting their teams in order for everyone to maximize their resources. For leaders, reflecting on how they can succeed at work, while not giving up their personal life, will lead to a greater understanding of how to be someone that others want to work for, and will follow.
This realization will undoubtedly be painful in the beginning. “Natural tendencies and habits that made you successful as a top contributor will no longer help you” in leadership. Making them challenging to unlearn. However, as someone who took years to really understand what this change tangibly looks and feels like, I can tell you that the short term discomfort is worth it personally and professionally for yourself and anyone that reports to you.
In the next section I will speak more about the steps I took to make this change and what accountability I put in place so that I would not revert back to my old habits that made me a top contributor but would no longer serve me in my leadership journey.