PART 1
Understand yourself and those you work with
As you take on a significant leadership role, your first inclination may be to get stuck in and make a difference, but perhaps the first phase is about standing still and observing, so that you build an understanding of yourself and those you work with. This period of reflection is crucial, so that as you enter a job, you go into it with some awareness of the match between you and the role.
This part looks in turn at knowing your strengths, understanding the context, watching and observing others and preparing your way forward.
1
Know your strengths
You may feel ill-equipped for this role and anxious about how you will do it. But others believe in you and have appointed you. They saw strengths in you that you might not fully appreciate.
You may have been appointed because people saw potential in you based on what you have done already. You may have been appointed because you bring complementary skills and understanding to the team.
Your youth or relative inexperience might have been a key reason for your appointment. They want your energy and freshness to infuse the whole team. Your self-perception might be that you do not bring many strengths as a leader, but all of us have been in a position of leadership. Encouraging a friend to think seriously about a particular job opportunity is a form of leadership that enables someone to think through their own next steps. Contacting someone to invite them to go with you to the theatre is a small act of leadership.
If you write down your strengths, and put excessive modesty on one side, you will be surprised about how many strengths you have. If you ask your friends at what are the qualities they most admire in you, you are likely to be embarrassed by the richness of what they say. We can often be far too modest for our own good.
It is worth reflecting on the transferable skills you bring. In the work environment, you might feel young and inexperienced. In a sports team, you might be the person team members look to for a lead. On the sports field you know how to encourage, steer and even direct. Those are skills that can be readily transferable into the work environment.
Being strong does not mean you always need to know the answer. Knowing your strengths is about asking good questions and drawing out the best in others. In the long run, the capability to bring out the best in others is far more valuable than a personal competence in a thousand and one different things.
When you bring a particular contribution as an expert, feel free to make that contribution, because that is the strength you bring. But always have a careful eye to how being an expert is interpreted. It can be expressed in either a disempowering or an empowering way. If you are not an expert, do not pretend to be one as it will not take long for others to realize your pretence. It is far better to ask a good question than to pretend to have expertise that is not there.
It is always worth asking the question: Why have I been appointed as a leader? What were the reasons why this decision was made? Is it because I’m a specialist or a good manager or a good member of the team? It is helpful to reflect on why people will be listening to you, or not. If you are not clear why you have been appointed, ask.
You may be nervous about becoming a leader for a number of different reasons. Perhaps you have not done this type of role before or you have not had experience of this particular context before. Perhaps you are nervous about how people will interpret your leadership contribution. But remember: they may be as nervous as you. You can take the first step in enabling people to feel at home with you by the strength of how you welcome and engage with them in those early stages.
Alex had just been appointed to lead a new project team implementing a computing system in a large firm. He had a strong track record as an expert, but was new to leadership. He knew that he had to switch from personal performance to working effectively through others. As he reflected on how he was going to lead his team, he talked with friends he played hockey with. They helped him appreciate his qualities in motivating members of the hockey team. Alex knew he had to draw on his strength both as an expert and as a good motivator of people outside work. He had got good feedback about why he had been appointed to the role and recognized that he need not be shy about the reasons why he had been promoted.
For reflection
- What do you see as the key strengths you bring to the role you are in?
- What are the transferable skills you bring from other spheres of your life?
- What would others see as your strengths that you might not fully recognize?
2
Understand the context
When you start a new role, those appointing you will have painted a picture about what needs to be done. You may have had the opportunity to triangulate that view talking to other people, or you may have been restricted from doing so. The context may, at first, seem clear, but there are inevitably many different perspectives rather than one single truth.
You may have been painted a rosy picture because those appointing wanted to attract good quality applicants. You may have seen a more depressing perspective – individuals stuck in their ways and not seeing opportunities ahead.
Understanding the context means getting as many different views as you can about what is the current reality and what might be the next steps. The mix of perspectives of your staff, other colleagues, customers and members of the organization will give a wealth of understanding. Do not expect everyone to have the same view. It would be deeply worrying if they did!
Any new leader needs to understand the history of their particular team or organization. What have been the tragedies or battles that the team has gone through? What are the scars that are still there? What is the folk history about successes or about times of renewal and enjoyment that are still sources of encouragement? Knowing and recognizing the history of the team or organization can help you become accepted as you build on that legacy in a constructive way.
It is important to gain a perspective about whether a group or team you are going to lead is regarded as successful or failing. Are you building on a good platform, or is upwards the only direction that you can take your team? Is there a burning issue that needs to be addressed straightaway, with an impending crisis if action is not taken? Do you have time to observe and understand the dynamics more before you need to take strong action?
Part of understanding the context is recognizing whether people are looking to you to spoon-feed them. Do they want a directive type of leader, or a leader who will be an enabler and stimulator of others? Most groups will have a mixture of people, some of whom want a directive leader and others an enabling leader. The skill is discerning what the balance is between those two requirements, both in what people say and what their actions demonstrate they really want; it is balancing adaptability to the context and the people, alongside being authentic to your strengths.
Understanding the context includes recognizing what people are looking to you for as their leader. They may be looking for someone who can give them a sense of purpose and help them sort out priorities. They may be looking for a leader who can protect them from the whims of clients or the unreasonable demands of senior people within the organization.
A good question to ask of yourself is: What one or two things can I do that will make the biggest difference to the success of this team? The responses can shed valuable light on the expectations people have and the context in which you will be operating.
Understanding the context is also about recognizing that you may well have under your authority people who are older and more experienced than you. Success comes through recognizing their experience and drawing upon it, while being rooted in your understanding about why you have been appointed. It is important not to try to pretend that you are more experienced than other people, while at the same time explicitly drawing on your own experience and insights so that together you find a constructive way forward.
Alex had a few team members with strong views who were quick to make their opinions heard. He made sure he sought the perspectives of everyone on the team, to understand the full context. It took time and energy to draw out the opinions of the quieter members, but their perspective proved invaluable in setting his approach. Once he understood where everyone was coming from, he could develop a clear way forward. Although his solutions didn’t always please everyone, each team member appreciated their part in the process and felt their views were being heard.
For reflection
- What elements of the history of your team or group do you need to build on?
- What aspects of the wider context need gripping and sorting first?
- How do you balance the range of perspectives you have received, some of which are optimistic while others are discouraging about future prospects?
