Often, the perfect moment to give someone more responsibility is before they’re ready.
— From Unreasonable Hospitality
Many managers struggle with leadership. This isn’t entirely surprising as many seem to think leadership is a feature of personality, rather than a learnable hard-skill. Therefore, it isn’t surprising when managers also struggle with giving promotions and team-building——initiatives that require looking beyond management, into the leadership realm. In my career, I’ve seen numerous instances where great teammates were lost due to poor leadership.
Disclaimer
There’s a critical importance in the difference between poor leaderships skills and downright bad people. I’ve had the lucky pleasure of not working with any leaders who were wholly unfit for duty. Instead, I’ve noticed the biggest problem is an unawareness of foundational leadership skills. It’s these skills I wish to criticize today, not the person lacking the knowledge.
The concern
Most managers withhold promotions for a number of logical reasons, which typically fail to hold up under scrutiny.
These concerns are sometimes rooted in our own insecurities as leaders. (Read that a couple times, and let it sink in.)
However, the most over-used, under-scrutinized, and costly reason to avoid a promotion of responsibility is:
They just aren’t quite ready yet
Pay special attention to the unspoken comments here:
- ”quite ready”: They aren’t totally unfit for the job
- ”yet”: They will be ready sooner or later
- ”just”: The only concern is their readiness
Upon first consideration, the teammates “readiness” is an important concern and not entirely without merit. The underlying concern here is actually compassionate: We don’t want our reports failing or being crushed under a new burden.
However, if we can confirm that the person in-question embraces excellence, and we agree that mistakes are an effective way to learn; We should be reasonably sure that presenting this individual with increased responsibility would benefit both the long-term growth of the individual and the business (this goes doubly if this person is an A-player).
See Also
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