Two Ways To Stunt Leadership Development
Many people are not prepared for leadership because their leader has not prepared them. Some leaders fail to develop the people around them because they don’t allow them to make decisions.
When a leader prevents people from making decisions at lower levels, the organization is creating an environment where low potential followers flourish and future leaders flee.
Let Them Decide!
Allowing people to make decisions, make mistakes and learn creates a healthy organization. The leader can create a culture of leadership by encouraging everyone to become wise decision makers. Or, they can stunt the development of new leaders by creating too many rules or demanding too much control.
1. Too Many Rules
Organizations all have essential rules and regulations that need to be followed. However, many of the rules imposed on people are created by the frontline leader.
At one point, I realized the rules I created for my team did little to improve their productivity. They were rules I liked because they fed my ego. I gave them a list of expectations that insured all their decisions ended up being what I would have done.
They didn’t need to think. They just needed to comply. It made me feel secure, but it taught them nothing. I had rule followers, not decision makers.
I decided to eliminate all the expectations and reports that I had created for my people. I had to realize that their way was not always wrong. Their way was just different.
When the decision was wrong, they learned some tough lessons. But- THEY LEARNED! Good rules prevent some really damaging mistakes. But unnecessary rules prevent growth.
2. Too Much Control
Some leaders demand that all decisions be run through their office first. If someone identifies a problem, they need to let the boss know and wait for an answer.
When I demand that all my team’s decisions be filtered through me, I become the bottleneck to progress. I may have the best answer for the moment. But if all the answers come from my desk, everyone on the team is waiting on me.
If I am making decisions my people should be making, nothing will move quickly. Initiative will be stifled. My people will become problem finders instead of problem solvers.
Problem finders are everywhere. There is no special skill required to be a problem finder. Problem solvers are the key to every organization.
I told my people to never bring me a problem unless they also brought a solution to discuss. If I heard a problem without a solution, I’d tell them we had nothing to discuss until they had a plan to solve it.
Over time, I heard less and less about problems because they were solving them without my help. It took discipline on my part to not be the “Shell Answer Man” for my team. But, I soon had a team of problem solvers as a result.
The Bottom Line:
If a leader has a team that lacks initiative, the first place the leader needs to look is in the mirror. The leader has the opportunity to build a team of leaders by allowing people to make decisions.
In this environment, mistakes will happen. But, so will growth. Leaders will begin to emerge and the team will begin to move quicker. Leader development is the responsibility of the leader with the title.
It doesn’t always take a training program developed by a consultant like me. It can be accomplished by eliminating the obstacles that prevent people from making as many decisions as possible at their level.
Once they begin to develop as decision makers, they will be well on their way to becoming the leaders of the future every organization needs.
Question:
What decisions are being made at too high a level in your organization?
I think Gen. George Patton was famous for telling his subordinates what to do, but never how to do it. This earned him the admiration and respect of his followers.
Great example. That is part of his style that rarely got highlighted in the movie, Patton.
Rules and controls create a risk-averse mindset. In a recent publication that I had the privilege of working on (http://www.amazon.com/Ops-Center-Industry-Lessons-Leadership/dp/1484148142/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1369163362&sr=1-1&keywords=ops+center), several retired flag officers who now serve as business execs, pointed to the fact that organizations kill leadership growth when you reward compliance and punish initiative. This often happens unconsciously within organizations.
I will check that out Kevin. Leadership through risk aversion is uninspiring to the followers.
I heard at the Chick-Fil-A Leadercast that rules tend to only keep people in line whereas standards, flowing out of shared vision are held in common by all and people help each other hold to them. Great stuff again, Dave!
The shared vision…communicated consistently…is the key to the standards being lived and not just complied with.
Excellent topic Dave. Regarding problem finders vs. problem solvers, I’ve found in some Army units the tendency to perpetuate the “problem description” and not pursue the “problem resolution”. It’s a leadership deficit when commanders drive their staff to describe problems in excruciating detail but stop short of demanding subordinate commanders actually resolve the problems. They fail to hold their subordinate commanders accountable to implement solutions… quite frustrating to watch, particularly when the staff has teed up the solution in the form of a “way ahead analysis”. I agree with your assessment here: don’t run all the solutions through the boss first. Give the subordinate leader/commander the opportunity to operate within the commander’s intent and risk tolerance, and get the mission accomplished / problem solved. My experience is similar to yours: it builds teams and grows the bench with future leaders.
Thanks!
Shane
A team with leaders at every level will always beat a team with leaders only at the top. Developing these leaders by allowing them to make the decisions within the commander’s intent prepares them to be commanders themselves.
Great stuff Shane!
“Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.” ~ GEN George S. Patton
As I was leaving the Army it was easy to see that the “Zero Defect” culture had led to stifling rules and a “an environment where low potential followers flourish and future leaders flee.” As a leader in the companies I have worked for, I have never forgot that. There are some companies that really get it and others that really don’t.
Great post.
I agree Eric. I love that Patton quote as well.