Contents
Great leaders give no orders
David Marquette (author of Turn the Ship Around) on Twitter:
Bad leaders give bad orders.
Good leaders give good orders.
Great leaders give no orders.
He echoes the ancient leadership advice of the Tao Te Ching)
A leader is best
When people barely know he exists
Of a good leader, who talks little,
When his work is done, his aim fulfilled,
They will say, “We did this ourselves.”
(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching)
Great leaders frame problems
From Henry Stanley:
good leaders don’t solve problems for their teams, they frame them.
As a sometime-leader who’s occasionally burned out feeling like I need to solve my teammate’s problems for them, this one resonates. Framing a problem (or opportunity):
- Stating what the current situation is
- Stating what isn’t good about it (and why)
- Stating what a better situation could look like
can be all that’s needed to let your team arrive at how to get to the better situation on their own. When a team isn’t solving a problem, it’s often because they disagree about 1.) what’s even happening, 2.) whether or not it’s acceptable, or 3.) what better could even look like.
This reminds me a lot of nonviolent communication‘s framework for conflict resolution, specifically 1. Observations, 3. Needs, and 4. Requests.
Great leaders aren’t afraid to name what’s happening
From Lara Hogan, leaders perceive and name what’s happening in the room, most usefully when things aren’t working. For example:
- “Hey, let’s just take a second to check in: it feels like maybe we are going in circles on this.”
- “Hey Cameron, I noticed your shoulders just slumped. I want to check in – how’s it going over there?”
- “I just want to hit pause and say, I sense that we are both not feeling heard right now.”
- “It feels like the energy in the room just changed.
Leaders learn the answer
My friend Max in Do Better Work, on leaders not needing to have all the answers:
The myth that leaders know the answer is just that—a myth. When we keep our work to ourselves, believing we should know what to do to make this project or that initiative a success, we set ourselves up for duds. Each of us, no matter our rank or role, has a limited vantage point. We can’t see all the angles. We need one another’s support and perspective.
The truth is, leaders learn the answer. The difference here is one word, but that one word sparks wildly different behaviors. Leaders who believe they should know the answer will keep things to themselves when they encounter important questions or challenges. They will look inward at the exact moment they should seek guidance. Leaders who believe they should learn the answer will default to asking for help and feedback. Their interactions with others will help them see more perspectives and possibilities so they can make more informed decisions.
In practice, this means being vulnerable about something you don’t know, clear about why it’s important to the team to know it, and courageous enough to find the answer (with help) even if it’s hard or scary (the answer may not be what you want).
To that last point, I’m reminded of another idea I got from Max, that “bad news early is good news,” and how perhaps one reason teams are reluctant to learn the answers to some important questions (“Do our customers really like our product?”, “Do employees really like working here?”, etc.) is that the answer to those questions might make us feel bad, and make us want to change. And that may be so! But ignorance is only bliss temporarily, and you can only start solving a problem once you become aware of it.
Leading teams through change
Is a whole thing: Change management
Leading through dominance backfires
In the 2021 paper “The Impact of Leader Dominance on Employees’ Zero-Sum Mindset and Helping Behavior”, the authors find that
Dominant leaders, who influence others by being assertive and competitive, shape their subordinates’ cognitive schema of success based on zero-sum thinking. Employees with a zero-sum mindset are more likely to believe that they can only make progress at the expense of others. We further propose that this zero-sum mindset results in less interpersonal helping among subordinates.
Leaders mold consensus
From my friend @ar3 on leadership: a leader doesn’t search for consensus, nor ignore consensus, but plays an active role in molding consensus.