I officiated my first wedding last month.  It was a great celebration.  But, I did not make it to the dance floor at the reception.  I saw a video of my dancing once.  That new perspective is all it took to keep me from the dance floor at this recent wedding.

If you have ever seen yourself on video after a wedding reception, you know what I am talking about.  None of us dance as well as we think.  It is not often we get the opportunity to see ourselves from another perspective.

Organizations who make a commitment to leadership development need to consider using an outside consultant for the same reason- the view from the outside is different.

A View From The Outside

The View From The Outside

As I have entered multiple companies as a consultant, I see their need for an outside perspective.  The simplest solutions that seem very straightforward to me are often met with great excitement from my client organizations.

I am not a rocket scientist or a leadership guru.  I am like that game film my son’s high school football team watches every Saturday morning.  I show my clients a view of their performance from a perspective they cannot possibly have because they were on the field at the time.

The view from the outside is never as good or as bad as the view from the inside.  Plus, the solutions are often much more evident to the informed observer than to the person actually playing the game.

To truly appreciate my current reality I need that outside perspective. That is why the coach stands on the sidelines and is not involved in each play.

Avoid Group Think 

I always liked leadership development sessions where people who did my job, led a topical discussion.  The fact that they walked in my shoes gave them credibility over a well-read person from HR who had never done my job.

Another advantage of using people from within an organization to teach leadership development is the language and culture of the organization is maintained.  Stories are immediately recognizable and applicable.

This strength can also be a weakness.  When everyone in the room comes from the same background, have similar experiences and work in the same culture, fresh ideas may be scarce.

Over time, as I sat in those peer led leadership sessions, I took fewer and fewer notes.  Why?

• The ideas and philosophies I heard in those sessions became stale.  We were recycling old ideas because we all came from the same culture.

If you keep doing what you have always done, you’ll keep getting what you already got.

Who is going to question why something has always been done a certain way?  Who is going to challenge the “group think” that is often prevalent in a homogeneous group of co-workers?

I have discussed leadership inertia in the past- Leadership Inertia- Friend & Foe.  A body at rest tends to stay at rest unless that body is acted upon by an outside force.  That outside force will cause that body to start moving or to change direction.

For leaders to get moving or to truly change direction, someone from the outside often needs to be the one delivering the force.  That force can be a new idea or philosophy.

Once someone from the outside has provided a team with different view of reality, that person can also bring a new set of solutions to the table.  Those solutions may be new to a homogeneous group from one organization, but they will not be new to someone who works with multiple organizations.

The Bottom Line:

No leader is absolved of the responsibility for developing others.  As a leader, that is one of my top priorities.  However, we as leaders need to realize we have a limited view of our reality.  Leaders, we are also part of the group think that goes on in out organizations.

Bringing in an outside perspective is an effective way to get the group moving or to change direction.  But, it is still my responsibility as the leader to make sure that the momentum generated is maintained.

It is the leader’s job to develop others in the best way available.  Bringing in someone from the outside will often let me see what type of dancer I really am.  It may be humbling, but it will help me and my team make wiser decisions in the future.

Question:

Have you sought out an outside view of your organization or yourself recently?  Why not?