You can’t fake good leadership
I spent 20 years in the Air Force. I served in some key leadership positions and watched the performance of many, many others.
One thing I noticed is that many people aren’t very good at leading. In fact, they don’t lead. They cover their own asses. They want to avoid culpability. They seek blind obedience. They seem to believe it’s appropriate to treat others in the worst ways they remember being treated.
What people fail to understand is that real power comes not from getting people to fear and obey, but from getting people to cherish your opinion so much that they come to you for advice and seek your input on their own.
The old adage, “If you have to go around telling everyone you’re in charge, you aren’t,” is something we all need to be reminded of once in a while.
Many weak or inexperienced people who find themselves with some measure of positional power try to lead with force. Maybe that’s how they were led. Maybe that’s how they perceive they were led. Some people will be influenced by this type of leadership, but only to the extent that they fear the consequences. In other words, they will do just enough not to get yelled at or otherwise abused.
To truly lead someone I think you have to take a genuine interest in them. Ask questions. Find out what a person’s goals and dreams are. What is their background? What are their ambitions? What are their fears? Chances are they are much different than yours were, when you were in their position, because they’ve probably had dramatically different experiences than you.
A couple of things happen when you dig into who your people are. First, you begin to understand people and how different and unique each of us truly is. You get an idea of what makes each member of your team tick. Does he or she value time off? Recognition? Autonomy? Group work? A quiet setting? A loud, party atmosphere? Once you find these things out, you can exert your influence as a leader to help each person achieve more. That’s actually your responsibility.
As an example, you may find someone like me. I grew up alone, so as a kid I pretty much always had the TV on whether I was watching it or not. As an adult, I find that some kind of background noise seems to maintain the momentum of my productivity, so it’s common for me to have music or the television on while I’m working. It doesn’t distract me; I feel more comfortable with some kind of noise. Conversely, my wife grew up with four siblings in a home-business environment where people came and went all day nearly every day. She finds comfort in silence. If she is working on a project alone, she will most likely choose to eliminate all background noise. A good leader will know these things about us and do whatever he or she can to put us each in the environment in which we feel most comfortable and will be most productive.
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The second thing that happens when you get to know your people more personally is that they begin to see you as someone who cares about them. You’re still the boss, and there is still a line between you that should always be respected (the leader is the line judge, and exactly where that line is drawn will differ from situation to situation). However, when you take a sincere interest in people, you quickly begin to transform from just some person who manages them as a resource into someone who values them and can be trusted. You become someone whom they get satisfaction from pleasing.
Read that again.
You become someone whom they get satisfaction from pleasing.
When you’re just someone people obey, they will do just enough to avoid negative consequences. When you’re someone they actually want to please, you’re much more powerful.
So how do you get there? I believe this is the biggest part of the problem. You can’t fake it.
You can fake mean. You can put on a show about how upset you can get, yell and curse and fire people and do mean things to those who cross you, and all that can be a charade you put on without even feeling anything. However, you can’t fake really caring about people enough to listen to them, ask them good questions, process and remember what they’ve told you, and make decisions based on the information you learn from them. You have to really care.
The good news is you don’t have to like everyone. You just have to care about them as an employee, as a professional, and as a human being. If you’re really self-centered (you should probably work on that) or if you find someone particularly unlikable (this happens), you could try thinking of them as an extension of yourself. They’re under your management, so their success or failure is a reflection of you as a leader. Maybe it helps to think of them as an investment. That’s fine, as long as you view each of them as a unique, interesting and complex human being.
One thing I’ve found in more than 15 years of managing many diverse types of people is you should never assume to know where someone is coming from. There was once a young lady under my supervision who was about the same age as my son. She had similar interests, viewpoints, and said many of the same things he often says. In many ways she was similar to my son. However, once I got to know her, I found out her family life was radically different from anything I had ever known — certainly different from the experience my son had growing up. Her experiences shaped the way she felt about many issues, and it was easy to understand that once I learned more about her.
We cannot assume anyone is seeing things the way we are. We’re all just too different.
So if you want to be feared, put on a show. People will tolerate it because they probably need the job, but they won’t like you and won’t give you nearly all they have.
If you’d rather get the most out of your team, cultivate respect by showing some. Find out who your people are. Care about them. Find out what you can do to help them succeed.
Lead them.
