The Leadership Path: What's Your Why?
Why do you want to be a Leader? At any stage of the journey to and through leadership, it is critical to understand your why as your guiding North Star to being and staying effective, and balanced between subjective and objective. We know the regular day to day expectations of professional leadership, like providing stability, influencing direction, developing and implementing strategy, etc. There are other challenging demands that cannot be escaped. Leadership positions at all levels demand conflict resolution, having hard conversations, and making hard decisions. Those challenges are not linear or not binary. They say, “Heavy is the head that wears the crown.”
When you declare within yourself that you want to lead others in a professional setting or that you want to advance in leadership, remain aware of the hefty responsibilities and the potential to impact others either positively or negatively. Let’s consider an example and a couple scenarios that occur at multiple levels on the leadership track:
- Executives at Stripe had to make the hard decision to release about 13% of their workforce. Understanding that they will be affecting the life’s of over 1000 people. Tangentially effecting the life’s of those individuals’ immediate loved ones.
- Leaders at the Director level have to reconcile tactical and strategic conflicts to ensure the objectives of their functions are meeting and pushing the larger company objective. Which sounds simple, but is quite stressful given that they are essentially managing up to senior leadership and down to their teams’ managers and individual contributors.
- Leaders in front line manager positions are tasked with helping individual contributors grow as professionals (and people), which requires providing opportunities that both satisfy the individual’s career goals and the team’s objectives. Often times leading to conversations in order to course correct under performers and/or performance management them off of the team or out of the company.
Take a moment to think about if you were in a position to have to make those decisions and have those conversations to resolve conflict in the name of business. The reality of the situation is if things go sideways for people, from a personal perspective, due to leadership decisions, it’s really not personal. It’s just business.
Taking the Stripe example a step further. The decision making process for deciding which departments need to shrink was purely to resolve a business issue. Likely the preservation of finances. What wasn’t a deciding factor, was the personal character and qualities of the people affected. Regardless of the emotions of the decision makers and the impacted employees.
Moving through decision making in leadership with the simple understanding of, “it’s not personal, it’s just business,” develops into one of two types of leaders. Either callous or overly empathetic. Neither is healthy. Knowing your why and allowing it to be your North Star can create a balance in your style and how you handle challenging situations that are an inevitable part of being in a position of authority. Getting deep enough with yourself to know your why also allows you to draw from a reservoir of awareness of self and others.
What Leadership Is Not
Leadership is not dictatorship. And if you think it is, quite frankly, you may be one of those callous types. That’s okay because we’re not here to judge. We’re here to question why anyone who is aspiring to or is already in leadership wants to be; the why. This type of questioning requires self assessment, understanding of self, and honesty. Following the assumption that unchecked leadership is the right way to lead is in fact misleading all of the people who are looking to you for direction. The break down will manifest slowly, but surely. The vision will be lost and the talent will follow.
Examine a very physical representation of business dynamics, such NFL or NBA teams. There are the players, which we can compare to individual contributors. The ones suiting up and doing the work to meet the objective. In the case of sports, that is to win. If any player is under performing or not fitting in well with the system, they’ll be benched. Some are removed (traded) either by request or with no contribution to the decision at all. They are bound by the coaching staff and front office leadership decisions. The coaching staff, like front line and middle management at company, have a level of authority to implement a strategy or system that will achieve success. However, ultimately their decisions are bound by the front office of the organization, which we can compare to VP or C-level leadership. If a team is failing consistently under systems that the coaching staff implements, the front office makes the decision to remove the head coach. Are you noticing the cascading effect within authority and decision making?
In business, everyone reports to someone. Even the CEO has a boss; that is the board of directors. Any shot caller’s decisions will need to be vetted. There are checks and balances. Yes, as stated earlier, leaders are required to have tough conversations and make hard decisions. Though the process is and has to be somewhat democratic to achieve equitable success.
A common misperception is that decision makers are allowed to do what they want and make unchecked demands. There are layers of management in place to ensure that doesn’t happen. If you are under the impression that being in a position of authority will be best because you can make all of the decisions based on your own personal perspective, we wish you the best of luck on your journey.
What Leadership Is
It starts with self awareness. Coupled with the awareness that there’s a common goal to be accomplished that can’t be successful without a concerted effort. As a leader, your job is to keep paths to success clear and influence the elements around you to meet challenges and overcome obstacles that rise along the way. While promoting a productive environment based on shared principles. Achieving that starts from a personal place of inward or subjective questioning, shifting your perspective to questioning the impact to others, then finding a middle ground that is objective and solution-oriented.
The awareness that solid leadership demands offers the wherewithal to know that what works for you might not be the same as what works for the others. There are recurring challenges in working and connecting with people who have different styles, perspectives, and personalities. Each person playing a critical role in helping you as it pertains to completing the mission. Understanding that, how can you make sound decisions without awareness and considering the impact and trade-offs of your choices?
Leaders have a responsibility to communicate up (who they report to) and down (who reports to them). Given that it’s abundantly clear that in business everyone reports to someone. Outside of great awareness, exceptional communication skills is required for successful leadership. At any level, knowing how to effectively communicate and receive feedback, concepts, and perspectives that are and aren’t your own can soften the blow of delivering in any rough conversations and executing on hard decisions.
Of course, different industries require different temperaments from their authority figures. In any case, getting a point across in a manner that keeps the path to success clear on all sides is priority. Strike a balance between callousness and being overly empathetic. Because yes, the reality is business is business. This means that you can’t and won’t please everyone, but you can be fair and objective. When you’re put in positions that challenge your leadership, you have to know why you’re in it. Is it for the glory or for the service?
The Reward of Leadership
Being in a position of authority can be rewarding. No, not because you get to be a checked shot caller or you get more money (which isn’t always true). You get to be a coach. Helping people get ahead in their lives, grow as professionals, and tangentially as humans. Assisting them in developing their strengths and finding their passions. All while they’re helping you navigate your assignment.
Through leading a team, function, or entire organization, you have the luxury of developing a vision and working with other talented individuals see it through. The best leaders understand that it’s important to invest in people smarter than them in a multitude of different areas. It’s satisfying to watch your vision come alive and evolve. Maybe it starts with you, but it definitely doesn’t end with just you. Hence the demand for self awareness and awareness of your impact on others. Whether you recognize it or not, leadership is a service to others. While you may get busy being of service, reflection and introspection on why you do this is critical to maintaining your balance.
Through being a leader and helping people develop, you also get to learn and develop yourself. There are circumstances that require you to apply different parts of your personality, temperament, and strengths that may not developed. Those situations will stretch you as a person and as a professional. If you thought that you were the most well rounded person or there weren’t areas where you need to grow, leadership will humble you and expand your capacities.
What’s your Why
So, now that we’ve gotten it out of the way that leadership isn’t about you. It’s not hard to understand why many talented people who have the capability to be great leaders opt out. They either know themselves or understand some of the challenges associated with being responsible for the success of a team. On the side of the coin, it’s easy to understand why strong individual contributors want to become leaders. Perhaps they know themselves as well. Maybe they haven’t asked themselves why, but vowed that they would be better or make better decisions than the leaders that they couldn’t stand. Not considering the unforeseen situations that arise, which inevitably comes with managing and leading people.
The part of leadership that is about you is the growth that you experience through being held accountable for the success of another entity. If you’ve never asked yourself why, do your research, find a leadership coach, mentor, or sponsor. Self assess — understand who you are, who you are not, and your motives. Then learn and understand the depth of what leadership is and is not in whichever arena you’re a part of. Then gather your why and check in with that regularly. If you cannot lead yourself and hold yourself accountable, what can you offer a team of others?
