Transitioning from an individual contributor role into a leadership & management position can be a daunting challenge. Leading people is difficult but also rewarding. To make it easier for aspiring leaders I put together some guiding principles that will help with the transition. Those principles have passed the test of time and have been identified and used by many great leaders before (I certainly did not invent them).
When you read up on the principles always be aware that you will have to find your own leadership style. This will come naturally over time. The principles are supposed to be a help for you. Adapt and test what works for you. This is a journey and not an event, so have some fun with it.
Before we jump into the principles I would like to bring up some points for consideration and reflection:
As a leader, you should be aware that your impact often goes beyond what you perceive or assume. The ethics and moral climate of any organization are defined in the higher echelons, and as a leader, you are now responsible to shape this culture. Even if you think you just lead a smaller team don’t underestimate your impact and always try to aim for the best possible outcome.
The main challenge of leadership is identifying the right people, inspiring them to work hard, and execute tasks willingly. To be successful with this there are simple (but not easy) characteristics that a leader should have or develop (according to Hal Moore):
- A leader must be competent.
Incompetent leaders are not respected. Ensure you know what you are doing. Continuously work on understanding your environment and learning the trade. It is ok to not know everything, don’t act like you do! Respect the experience and knowledge of others. - A leader must have good judgment.
You will make many decisions, having good judgment about the right or wrong decisions as well as a good understanding of people is important. If you make a wrong call, learn from it. Take notes and revisit past decisions to improve. - A leader must have character and will.
As a leader, you will face difficult situations and challenging people. Staying calm under pressure, taking conflicts in stride, and being able to stand up despite opposition requires character and will, develop this continuously.
One last thing I would like to highlight before we jump into the principles is that you should be aware that being a leader does not always mean that you will be loved! Sometimes it can be a lonely position! Sometimes you will have to make unpopular decisions. Be aware of this. Being liked should not be a priority for you, instead, focus on gaining the respect of your charges through integrity and competency.
The first two principles that will help you with this are:
- Never hold your men/women to standards that you cannot meet yourself (don’t be a hypocrite)
- Take responsibility for your own actions, decisions, and the actions of the organization (If something goes wrong, you take the blame. If something goes well give the credit to the team)
Guiding principles – Taking over a team
You as a leader can either contaminate your environment and people with your attitude and actions or you can inspire confidence!
- Guiding Principle: When you take over, take over and set the standards!
You are assigned the lead role, so take over. Yes, there might be people that are older or more experienced. This is ok. Be confident in your ability. When starting in your new role introduce yourself to the team. If you are unsure what to say, you could start by telling them that you might not know everything but that you will give your best for the team and expect the same of each individual in return. - Guiding Principle: Be visible to those you lead.
A leader must be visible to those he leads. Have a positive attitude, be self-confident and never give off any evidence that you are uncertain about a positive outcome. Your conduct and attitude will reflect in the team. Ensure that you have regular touchpoints with employees of your organization (depending on the size e.g. via 1:1s, team meetings, inspections or “floor walks”, open-door policy, etc) - Guiding Principle: Be consistent in your decisions and behavior.
Having a new leader is creating uncertainty. Your team will have to learn how you lead, what your values are, and how you make decisions. It is important that you are consistent in your behavior and how you make decisions, otherwise, men and women will find it difficult to take decisions on their own. - Guiding Principle: Be humble and observe, then decide and take action.
Especially in the beginning, hold yourself back with new ideas and changes. First observe what is going on, what works well, and what needs improvement. Identify your strong players and learn the critical aspects of your business or organization from them. Once you have those insights you can start making decisions. Any leader that comes in from the outside and imposes his or her will blindly will only earn resentment.
Guiding Principles – While leading (Tasks, Challenges, and what to do)
As a leader, you are paid to get things done well and plan ahead while having good sound judgment doing it all. The guiding principles below will give you some direction on how to achieve this. Before I jump into the principles I would like to highlight that it is important to understand that constraints are normal, you will always have too little time, money, people, or other limiting factors. How you are dealing with them defines your leadership.
- Guiding Principle: Identify the main constraints in your environment and consider them during decisions.
Most decisions will come down to timing and money. Only if you are aware of your constraints and limiting factors you can come up with mitigation plans and good decisions on where to prioritize and what to execute - Guiding Principle: Constantly challenge yourself and adapt.
Ask yourself continuously “What am I doing that I should not be doing? And what am I not doing that I should be doing to influence the situation in my favor?”. There are always things you can do! - Guiding Principle: There is always one more thing to influence a situation in your favor.
You have a mission or goal that you need to achieve with your team. Do whatever you can to influence your current situation in a positive manner. There is always one more thing that you can do. You are never done! - Guiding Principle: Ensure everyone in the team understands the leader’s intent.
First of all, it is your responsibility to understand what your manager or leaders want from you. You need to ensure that you do not only understand what you are supposed to do but what the desired outcome is and more importantly why. In all organizations, the people on the ground floor can often make the best decisions if they understand the desired outcome. Secondly, whenever you distribute tasks or objectives ensure that your subordinate leaders and team members understand the plan and how the pieces fit together. Having a very clear understanding of what outcome you try to achieve will allow the individuals to make the best decisions. This is an absolutely critical part of decentral organizations. How well the leader’s intent is clear to the organization is often the make or break of a successful outcome or a disaster. - Guiding Principle: Communicate in a clear and precise manner.
Clear and precise communication is essential. Keep the background and level of information others might have in mind. Don’t assume everyone knows what you know. Describe your ask, the expected outcome, and the boundary conditions clearly. If possible include the WHY as well. - Guiding Principle: Don’t get complacent.
It might look like nothing is wrong or everything runs smoothly. However, whenever you get complacent something will pop up and hit you in the face with reality. Always look for improvement, ways to position your team better, or prepare against potential challenges.
Guiding Principles – Personal Conduct
In this section, I will share what principles you can use to carry yourself. Your actions and attitude will resonate in your organization and especially with your team. Your behavior is constantly scrutinized as a leader so you need to be aware that you set the standards. All the principles that are discussed might sound easy, but applying and living them can be challenging. Still, I believe it is worth a try.
- Guiding Principle: Ownership.
This is for me one of the absolute key principles. You need to own everything in your life and that includes also failures. Yes sometimes external factors play a role, however, there is always something you can do to better yourself or your situation, so do it. Don’t blame anyone else. In a leading role, you also need to protect the team. If something goes wrong, you take the blame. If the team did something well give the praise to the team. To be clear: Just taking the blame is not ownership. Taking the blame and taking action to improve it is. - Guiding Principle: Discipline yourself.
A strong work ethic is important in a leader. Therefore the first person you have to lead and discipline is yourself. You set the standard for your organization and need to ensure that you are giving a good example. - Guiding Principle: No job is ever beneath you.
There will be always jobs or tasks that you might not like. Take them in stride and do them. Again your attitude will reflect on the team. Till today I often do things I performed in my previous roles. Your team sees if you hand off minor or unthankful tasks. If you have the time, do what is in front of you. - Guiding Principle: Make your subordinates feel valued and safe.
Ensure that your employees or subordinates feel they are valued team members. Create an environment where people feel safe to make decisions and take action. The same loyalty that goes up the chain of command should also go down or across the network. Highly functioning or performing teams are the ones who feel the leadership is fair and their teammates “have their back”. - Guiding Principle: Be a lifelong learner.
The leaders who fail are usually those who think they know everything, or who think they have nothing left to learn. Learning for a leader does not strictly mean gaining new technical knowledge or sharpening a skill. It means continuously honing your capabilities in how to create trust and loyalty, how to further strengthen one’s team or minimize its weaknesses as well as how to improve processes and push individual talent. And all this while creating an inspiring atmosphere.
Guiding Principles: How to handle challenges
In life as in business, you will face challenges and defeats. What defines us is how we deal with them and get back on our feet. What helped me are some of the below principles. I find them quite challenging to implement and need to revisit them regularly.
- Guiding Principle: Don’t act rash on first reports of issues & escalations.
The first reports on issues or problems are usually exaggerated for good or bad and are not entirely accurate. This is normal since in moving or developing situations the leader or expert on the “frontlines” try to fight the issues and aim to get an overview. The first reports you get are usually fragmented due to the chaos. So stay calm, try not to make rash decisions and aim to get a better overview of the situation. - Guiding Principle: Don’t overreact! And never overreact to an overreaction.
Even under pressure try to remain somewhat calm. Take a deep breath. Take action but don’t go overboard with it. Especially under pressure try to take a step back from the situation so that you can decide as emotionless as possible. If someone is overreacting and completely in your face take your time to respond. Being somewhat impassive and dictating your speed can be a powerful tool here. - Guiding Principle: Even in defeat, carry yourself professionally and maintain your disciplineShit happens. We fail and lose sometimes, this is simply part of life. The best way to recover is to take the beating in stride and keep up your discipline and routine. This is the quickest way toward recovery.
- Guiding Principle: There is a solution to every problem.
When confronted with a seemingly unsolvable problem or situation remember, there is always a way! Some might be more complex, but there are always options to move forward. In such situations don’t hesitate to ask for help. Take counsel and support from those who have the experience and information. - Guiding Principle: Don’t be a complainer, be a solverIt is ok to be unhappy about a situation, however, you should always ask yourself what can you do or what are you doing to make it better. Don’t complain to your boss. Ask for guidance, make him/her aware of the challenges or situation, and come with proposals.
Conclusion
Being a leader is challenging, rewarding, and complex. There are many more things that could be said or discussed, however, in the end, all theory needs to be applied. The execution and living of those principles is not easily done. Simply start with applying some of them and keep continuously learning. Of course, I would love to hear from you what helped or if you have principles on your own that worked well for you.