Turning managers into leaders

We are doing some reading at work. For our routine manager’s meeting — which is exactly where managers belong, in meetings — we were assigned six articles to read from HBR. The articles are fascinating and enlightening, but not so much as the discussion and debate that ensues.

Beginning with What Leaders Really Do, I immediately find common ground in the notions of exclusivity in the roles of manager and leader, control vs. motivation. I liken The Work of Leadership to a follow-up, especially in the declaration that “A leader must sequence and pace the work. Too often, senior managers convey that everything is important. They overwhelm and disorient the very people who need to take responsibility for the work.” The mentors who have taught me the most have been those who slow me down, let me work, and keep me out of the “giant hairball” (Gordon McKenzie). I’ve directed my professional evolution towards taming the fray and allowing adequate space and time for creatives to be lead, not over-managed, a dark manipulative force that utterly assassinates creativity. Interestingly, my blog on Frankendesign at the time was aimed at the fallacy of multi-tasking your way to quality. Focus and motivation is much more effective. But I digress.

I love the line: “One can lead with no more than a question in hand.” But I find my practice already in line with the ideas. Should-be obvious revelations about rigidity defeating notions of fluidity required for adaptive situations are insightful. But it’s not until Why Should Anyone Be Led By You that I start asking myself the tough questions.

This article first asks leaders to reveal their weaknesses. I know what mine are, mostly managerial. I hate filling out paperwork and operating on a clock. But I try to fit in and perform the tasks out of respect for what others need from me and the expectations on them that are connected to me. Sometimes though I don’t speak up for myself. I try to cover-up my weaknesses, pretend they are not there. In turn this leads to denial and also conflict when someone calls me out. I don’t expect my followers to be perfect, but I do expect that unreasonably of myself. Of course that’s not an excuse to not improve on weaknesses, but it does help to expose them and call them for what they are in setting expectations. Essentially, there should be enough strengths leading to getting things done that in the end negate the flaws while the cooperative environment distributes reasonable responsibility away from them.

Secondly, leaders should be sensors. I have an anthropological approach to everything I do. I record events and fossils in the aftermath. I notice details from the bird’s eye to the trivial. This level of information gathering can annoyingly serve as preambles into rambling rants and buzzword mantras. But it can blossom into effective storytelling. It fine tunes my attention to detail, including what is unseen. My burgeoning life disciplines of yoga and meditation involve the invocation of intuition, a sixth sense, a third eye. And I’m often keenly aware of what is left unsaid or what action a single moment prescribes unconsciously. The take-away from the article is validation that this can be, and should be acted upon in the context of (business) leadership. I’ve been hesitant to translate this through creative to leadership personas in professional life as the man-of-science approach has been the more effective for management duties. But now I look forward to letting a more acute awareness drive my actions outside the realm of spreadsheets and agendas.

I find the leadership history sidebar very interesting, albeit a bit vindictive towards communalism if not a shout-out to Adam Smith himself. It’s not until the final article in our prescribed set that I found some more “worldly” enlightenment in quotes like “Rampant individualism has replaced authentic self expression with mere selfishness,” and “Followers want to be part of something bigger than themselves, to be in solidarity with others and to have a social experience.” But again, I digress. Freud, credited for changing the face of leadership psychology, gave the unconscious a place in the individual, but Jung extended it to a collective existence. Max Weber is correct to point out that bureaucracies dehumanize, but rampant individualism lends credit to social darwinism. Leadership, as explored in this article, is largely communal through shared responsibility, empathy, and intuition (being perceptive of the whole). The recent history of leadership as a rejection of rationalism plays greatly towards creativity, but should not be taken as a sine qua non of lassie faire.

One of my most challenging responsibilities, as a father and a professional, is practicing tough empathy. After growing up in a strict order and control household, I rebel at every sign of forced structure. Hence it is easy for me to be overly lenient. It is easy for my tone to be soft and too forgiving. I care greatly not just about people I lead or manage, but about people, period. But in leadership there must be a balance of respect for both the individual and for the task at hand. The same holds true for community. I have strong opinions, and I have strength in experience. Though often I demean or censor that in order to not ruffle feathers, come off as unappreciative, or offend someone else’s sensibilities. However, I am learning that I offer more as a leader, as a mentor, if what I bestow goes beyond a superficial relationship and becomes the foundation of actual learning and growth for both leader and follower with true sharing and commitment. Tough empathy through risk taking and responsibility sharing builds character and relationships much deeper than any feigning of care through caution and permissiveness.

Dare to be different as a leadership characteristic? Okay. Corporate dress codes are a scapegoat for insecurity and an invitation for the holier-than-though. Deadlines to the minutia are the indulgences of control freaks. Acronyms are a status symbol for the lazy and verbally challenged. I strive to be easy to work with, but not at the expense of corporate systems and stereotypes degrading to the evolution of the mind and spirit. Proper is not synonymous with productive. Now I’m not here to rock the boat. But if you’ve grown complacent with the tide, I’d like to introduce you to some bigger waves.

The Crucibles of Leadership article of the set is very applicable to my history. A managerial culture clash and failed project with Sam’s Club during the height of the internet bubble and a hugely successful but short lived stint as a partner of my own full-service new media company are providing lessons and insight to this day by way of reflection and adjustment. But the stand-out quote of all articles, for me, toward the end of the Why Should Anyone Be Led By You, is that leaders should “…be themselves but with more skill.” In this article, I was able to most closely compare my vision and methodology of leadership and come away with validation to act upon key areas I am most secure in but most timid about, not just as a leader, or a professional, but as a human being. And just like followers, that’s what leaders are, first and foremost.