Listen on your favorite app:
Transcript
Hey friend, one failure that happens in leadership comes from the different meanings of individual performer and leader.
Sometimes people get these confused in their positions and it messes them up as a leader. So in this episode we’re going to dive into the differences and the mistakes that are made with this so that you can avoid it as a leader yourself and so you can recognize it and possibly even help others.
Individual Contributor vs. Leader
So first an individual performer performs. They are in a position in a function where they contribute themselves. It’s their work that matters they produce
For example, a salesperson, they produce sales. A marketing person may create marketing material, and so on.
A leader’s job, on the other hand, isn’t really to get results themselves, but to lead a group of people to get results. Does that difference make sense? As a leader, you’re no longer about performing yourself to make things happen. You’re about getting others, leading others to get results.
The first mistake
So one of the first mistakes people make when it comes to this difference is that sometimes people hire or promote people from a position based on how they perform as an individual versus their leadership and management skills.
So let’s say someone is really good at sales. They do really well. They sell very well. So as a reward or because they perform so well, they promote them to a sales manager.
The thing is, selling stuff and managing salespeople are two different functions and they require different skills. It’s just because someone’s good as a salesperson doesn’t mean they’ll be good in managing salespeople.
This applies to marketing, even applies to education. Sometimes from my perspective, people are often hired because of their knowledge, their degrees, they have a doctorate in something. So they get put in these leadership positions in education.
But because you have a doctorate, because you’re knowledgeable, doesn’t mean you’re good at leadership. There’s a big difference there. And in general, and we’ll talk about this in another episode, it’s better to have lower competence and high trust and influence versus having super high competence and knowledge and low trust and influence and leadership ability.
So often these people are hired to put in these positions, and they don’t have the skills they to perform well in that position because it’s a different function. They’re not performing individually anymore. They’re performing, they’re leading a team to perform.
One reason people are sometimes brought up to these positions in this way is because the people who are hiring them don’t understand it themselves. They’re not necessarily the best leaders themselves. So they hire other people who will end up not being great leaders either. They don’t know they have the skill because maybe they don’t have the skill.
That may not always be the case, but that probably happens a lot.
The second mistake
So the second mistake, what happens when these people get into these positions, is that they think performance versus leading.
They were a salesperson, and now they’re a sales manager. But their mindset’s not, “Hey, I need to lead people to get these results.” Their mindset is often, “I still need to get results myself.” They’re still in that performer mindset.
And so sometimes they try to do the calls themselves. Maybe they try to do it all themselves. Maybe they try to take over from people. Maybe they feel like they have to be there in every cell, otherwise they’re not being a great leader, or whatever it may be.
And sometimes being in that leadership position kind of builds a little bit of arrogance, depending if they don’t understand it. Maybe they don’t listen well because they think they’re a high performer, so are a leader now, so they don’t need to listen to the other’s inputs.
The third mistake
Whatever it may be, they get the wrong mindset because, third mistake, they weren’t trained. It’s not necessarily bad to raise someone up who doesn’t have a lot of knowledge in leadership because none of us start with the perfect knowledge or all the knowledge we need to be a great leader. We have to grow into it.
So, if you’re going to move someone into a position of leadership, you need to train and prepare them. Sometimes this doesn’t happen because, as we said before, sometimes the people who bring them up don’t know themselves. They assume because they’re a performer they can lead well.
They don’t recognize the different skills that, so they don’t train them, they just assume. And part of that too is the mindset of, if someone’s performing well, the next step is management. And that shouldn’t be the only option.
If someone wants to continue in sales, then they should have some kind of track to continue in sales. If someone wants to stick with marketing, they should have some kind of track to stick with marketing.
The move to management should not be the automatic, because not everybody wants to be that. And not everybody wants to go through all the training and all of that that will take to be a great leader.
So, it’s important when people are put in these positions from performer and they’re moving to a management, make sure there’s some training for them. That’s important, because often you don’t know what you don’t know.
These people are put in these positions, and they don’t know that they don’t know leadership well, the cliches, the memes, the superficial stuff on LinkedIn, whatever it is, and they don’t understand that, “Oh, there’s a whole nother depth of level, there’s so much I don’t know as a leader, I didn’t realize that I was supposed to stop the performing mentality and grab that leadership mentality.”
If you weren’t trained
So, if you’re that person, if you’re that leader or manager who was moved from performer to now manager, and you weren’t trained, you don’t know much about leadership, that’s okay.
Don’t feel bad about it, just start learning. That’s the best thing. Awareness is the first big step. If you realize, “Hey, I have a ways to go,” that’s good. That means you have the right mentality and attitude and can start growing.
So I encourage you to do that. Keep listening to this podcast. You can go to our website, go to nomorebadleaders.com. It’ll actually redirect to a main site right now. And there’s a tab that says leadership with a bunch of articles you can read.
There’s also the books on leadership out there that you can read. And we actually have an article on our website about some of the best leadership books you can read. And if you want some more ideas, you can email me and I can share some of the things that I’m reading myself or read lately or that I recommend.
You can find the mentor or other leaders and try to learn from them. If you are a leader who’s hiring people, who’s promoting people from a performer position to a manager or leader position, make sure to give them training.
Make sure they know what they don’t know. Make sure they understand what the job entails, that it’s not a performer job anymore, that they’re leading others to perform, that they’re leading others to bring about results.
Don’t set them up for failure. Help them transition. Mentor them and don’t leave them hanging.
So in this episode, we discuss the difference between an individual performer and the leader and the different skill sets and mentality that can entail.
