Episode 256 Transcript:

0:00:00 Ramona Shaw: This episode is all about the leadership identity shift, moving from being an executor to being an influencer. Here are the two questions this podcast answers. One, how do you successfully transition into your first official leadership role? And 2 how do you keep climbing that leadership ladder and continuously get promoted? Although the competition and the expectations get bigger, this show The Manager Track podcast will provide the answers.

0:00:27 Ramona Shaw: I’m your host, Ramona Shaw. I’m on a mission to create workplaces where work is seen as a source of contribution, connection and personal fulfillment. And this transition starts with developing a new generation of leaders who know how to lead so everyone wins and grows. In the show, you’ll learn how to think, communicate and act as a confident and competent leader. You can be welcome to The Manage Track podcast.

0:00:52 Ramona Shaw: Today we’re going to explore one of the most significant transitions in your leadership journey, and that is to evolve from an executor to a strategic leader. In the early stages of your career, success really comes from execution, getting things done. You’re valued for completing tasks, delivering projects, solving problems, and being productive. But then as you advance, the landscape shifts. You will have to shift because your worth is no longer measured by your personal output, but how effectively you guide and elevate others.

0:01:32 Ramona Shaw: And while this may intellectually make total sense, this transition can actually feel pretty uncomfortable. You might start to think, gosh, I’m not really doing any real work when you’re not so hands on. Or you might start to resist delegating because it just seems so much easier and faster for you to do it. Or you might worry about losing credibility with your team even or others by stepping back from execution.

0:02:00 Ramona Shaw: Or you might find actually doing the tasks really rewarding, either because you simply intrinsically enjoy the work or because you feel good about yourself when you do something well and when you can add value to others, when you can help them or when they tell you, hey, good job, love this, well done, all of these things feel good to us and then we may be inclined to hang on to them, to do that, to spend our time in these areas that make us feel good, help us feel fulfilled, make us feel rewarded, that we feel competent in, secure in.

0:02:37 Ramona Shaw: While all this other stuff, this influencing this relationship thing, the people leadership aspect of work, that can seem uncertain and we’re not quite clear of how we’re going to be successful in this. And as such it’s totally normal that we would then gravitate towards the things we know we’re good at and we know how to do so. This identity shift, though to really go through the discomfort is fairly challenging for most leaders. And in our work at arcoa, we support leaders through this transition all the time.

0:03:07 Ramona Shaw: And so personally I know not only from my own experience, but also from now, having supported thousands of managers in different formats go through this transition and hearing about their challenges. And when we break down what’s so challenging about this transition, it really boils down to four main shifts, which by the way, I’ve wrote about in the Confident and Competent New Manager book that you can find on Amazon. We’ll link to it in the show notes.

0:03:34 Ramona Shaw: The essential mindset shift that I want to talk to you today about is evolving from an executor to a leader. So I’m going to talk about some practical strategies to embrace strategic leadership without feeling like you’re slacking off or you’re leaving your team hanging. Now, I’m going to share a quick example here. I worked with a client who, let’s call this person Mike. Mike was actually a standout manager at a tech company known for flawless execution, really strong attention to detail, really creative and problem solving, and a hard worker.

0:04:08 Ramona Shaw: So a lot of attributes that made him stand out and get a promotion into leadership. Now suddenly, though, in this position where he was overseeing a number of his former peers, also pretty strong performers, and a handful of other people, actually people who were not doing what he used to do in the past, he had a little less visibility into their roles. And because he moved from basically no direct reports into having, I believe was six or seven direct reports, right away, he suddenly spent a whole, whole lot of his time leading the team and helping the team accomplish things.

0:04:47 Ramona Shaw: And that’s really when the challenges start to show up. Mike found himself jumping into fixed problems, right? He felt like he knew best and he was actually really good at problem solving. But then if someone was raising a problem or he would become aware of a problem, instead of assigning the person in charge of it, he would get called in and fix it. And he would feel really good about that. Actually, before he realized what the side effect is of him doing that, he would also get lost in details.

0:05:18 Ramona Shaw: He would dive really into the nitty gritty gritty of things. And with the team that he was leading that did work that he wasn’t so familiar with, he felt like he needed to understand everything in order to get the full picture. He needed to know from the beginning to end what they were doing, what good look like, what’s bad looked, because otherwise he wouldn’t be able to be a manager. He Wouldn’t be able to answer their questions and be supportive to them. And he assumed that was his role. His role was to solve problems and to guide people and direct them and to make sure he understands everything.

0:05:52 Ramona Shaw: He once said to me something along the lines of, I feel like I’m not working as hard anymore, but I’m constantly exhausted. And this is exactly where many new managers get stuck. It feels like at the end of the week that they were super busy, constantly in meetings, constantly talking to people, helping everyone else. But if they look at what did I actually do, what were my accomplishments? Not a whole lot is on that list.

0:06:18 Ramona Shaw: And it can feel like they’re not pulling their weight. They see their team members all have a list of things that they did, but their own list is pretty short. And if Mike, in this situation or you, if this resonates with you, don’t recognize that that is normal and how this new role as more of an influence in a leader than an executor actually feels. And that is what it is about. And instead you think there’s a problem or you’re doing it wrong, or that people will judge you for not having a long list of accomplishments.

0:06:51 Ramona Shaw: Then it can start to feel draining or like you. And actually, you may start to compensate even more for it by going even more into problem solving mode, even more back into execution, in order to feel better about your week. And it’s totally understandable because for years, your success came from execution, right? You earned promotions by excelling at your work. Your instincts are tuned to identify and solve problems.

0:07:19 Ramona Shaw: That’s what your brain was really trained to do for years. You feel valuable when addressing these immediate challenges. It’s all totally normal. The very habits, though, that propelled you as an individual contributor can now become the obstacles, the biggest obstacles as leaders, because your role has fundamentally changed. And moving from an IC role into a leadership role is probably the biggest change in your career.

0:07:46 Ramona Shaw: In essence, it’s simply no longer about being the best at work, and it’s about creating conditions for others to do their best work. And even if you hear me say this and you think, ouch, that hurts my ego a bit, I get it, that’s also normal. And yet that’s exactly what many of the leaders have to start to embrace and find their own reward elsewhere by seeing, oh my gosh, as a team, we can do so much more by the way I make decisions, or by the way that I support them or develop my team, I have so much influence over what we’re doing or what we’re achieving or how people feel at work.

0:08:27 Ramona Shaw: And that starts to become the reward. But it is a shift. It’s different from the rewards that you got as an executor. And in order to go through this transition, it begins by reframing three deeply ingrained beliefs. The first is my value is my work. Now, your value is no longer your work. Your value to the organization, not your self worth. But the value to the organization is no longer the work that you deliver.

0:08:55 Ramona Shaw: Your value is your impact, your impact on others, how you lead them, how you elevate them, how you develop them, how you align them, how you create results, how do you challenge them, how do you bring and and cultivate an environment where you’re able to problem solve creatively with a team that is now your value. And many new leaders struggle here because they’ve always tied their value, perceived value to their personal output, their accomplishments on the to do list, right? Or the big projects or the quality of their, let’s say coding or the quality of their accounting or reporting or closing the deals with clients, the number of deals that they close, that sort of KPI was directly attached to the value they provided.

0:09:44 Ramona Shaw: But effective leaders measure success differently. And so instead of asking how much did I personally accomplish today? You have to start asking how did I clear obstacles for my team today? How, how did I clear obstacles for my team today? Or how did I provide clarity and direction? How did I elevate my team’s performance? And when you have good answers to those questions, that is when you start to recognize like, oh, I’m having impact, I’m progressing as all forward.

0:10:16 Ramona Shaw: So when you shift from measuring output to measuring impact, leadership overall starts to become more fulfilling. You are not going to feel like you’re moving away from what you’re good at to do something you’re mediocre at. Maybe this was the wrong move or a wrong career decision, or maybe people’s leadership is just not for you. If you have ever thought those things, but you haven’t actually gone through comprehensive leadership training and you haven’t learned about these shifts yet, then that would be the first step to do don’t give up on your leadership career, people leadership career yet.

0:10:48 Ramona Shaw: If that part is missing because it’s totally normal to feel that way as you’re shifting into that higher level role. And again, it takes awareness of the shift and it takes training to help you get through it. Now on that line of just executing a common trap that we see is people thinking, oh, it’s easier to do it myself in a moment. That might be true, but long term, it makes you the bottleneck. If you always step in to fix issues, your team never develops problem solving abilities.

0:11:19 Ramona Shaw: Think about teaching someone to drive. It’s like nerve wracking at first, right? They’re like, oh my gosh, just, can I just do it? Can I hold the wheel? This is like so uncomfortable. They may break too hard or miss a turn and your instinct is to just grab that wheel and take over. But if you never let them take control, they’ll never learn. And the same applies to your team. So some struggle is totally necessary for growth.

0:11:49 Ramona Shaw: Just like we would observe our kids learning how to drive a car, we understand that they need to struggle. They need to be stressed and anxious and nervous and overwhelmed at times. They’re like, yep, been there. That’s part of the learning journey. But if I step in and I take that away from them, they’ll never learn. No, instead I have to stay calm. I have to let them know, you’re going to figure this out, you’re going to learn it. I’m confident. I know you got this right. It just takes some time. I’m here to help.

0:12:16 Ramona Shaw: Let me guide, let me provide some feedback, let me make some suggestions. But you’re doing this in a calm tone, demonstrating confidence. You’re not grabbing the wheel, hopefully, unless it would turn into a disaster. Same is true with leadership. Another point where this shows up and I’m just giving some examples of how this manifests itself at work. Something that we often hear is new manager saying, but I need to stay in the detail.

0:12:42 Ramona Shaw: That’s my job. Like I need to know. But if you’re constantly in the weeds and have a hard time keeping up with everything that’s already going on and you don’t spend any time on that bigger picture and the planning part, then who is doing that? It’s probably no one. But teams need it, your work needs it. That’s leadership. So strategic leaders are able to zoom out. They think beyond today’s task and start to consider things such as what will matter six months from now?

0:13:12 Ramona Shaw: Where is this team heading in context of the bigger organization? How do we get there? How can I foster an environment where my team thrives? Is even my team set up in the right way for us to achieve our current strategic goals or even our longer term strategic goals? Maybe our five year plan that the company has communicated, what does that mean for our team? How do we need to pivot or evolve or currently do we have the right people in the right seats on the bus or not. And if not, you got to develop a plan on how to make that happen.

0:13:46 Ramona Shaw: If you really start to think like you fully own it, almost like a business owner rather than an employee, you unlock that dimension of leadership right? Taking full on taking full ownership of where the team is at today and where you’re going, where you’re leading that team. The way to do this is one understand that’s not part of your job, going back to the way you think about it. But then more tactically, you gotta make time for strategic thinking.

0:14:13 Ramona Shaw: If you don’t carve out time to think, you’ll remain in reactive mode. So block out an hour weekly for strategic thinking. No emails, no messages, just you, a notebook and big picture questions. Maybe do a team SWOT analysis. Maybe look at your org chart. Look at the career plans of your team members. Look at the company objectives, the their OKRs or KPIs. Look at the strategic plan of the company. Choose one thing and then spend an hour thinking about what that means for you and your team.

0:14:48 Ramona Shaw: Ask yourself, what major challenges will my team face next quarter? What process most needs an improvement? Where are the biggest risks? Those are all questions to ask to move from a reactive to more proactive approach. And then I’m going to go back to delegating. When you struggle with delegating because you fear tasks won’t be completed correctly, then here’s the solution. Delegate outcomes, not just tasks.

0:15:17 Ramona Shaw: So instead of saying, hey, prepare this report. You can say, hey, I need a report that helps us understand our customer churn patterns outcome. What are you going for? So this is the what or the why, not the how. Now, when people grasp why something matters, right? And what you’re looking for more broadly, they take a greater ownership. Now of course, this only works with someone who already has a good baseline, right? A good sense of understanding of what’s going on, clarity about what you’re looking for and they have competence, but also some agency in their work.

0:15:53 Ramona Shaw: If you work with someone who doesn’t have that yet, where you saying hey, I need a report is just not good enough. You need more detail, Then check out the show note for a link on a specific episode dedicated to developing the skill of effective delegation. Because we’re not going to go into that in detail in this podcast episode. Another way to really demonstrate that you’re leveling up and are bracing this shift is to communicate differently.

0:16:20 Ramona Shaw: Start to incorporate a vision and priorities. For example, here’s where we’re headed. Here’s why this matters to our team. Or you talk about priorities. This is what needs our focus right now. And here is why. You can also talk about empowering the team. Hey, I trust your judgment on how to approach this. Instead of getting involved and wanting it done your way, look for moments where you can let someone take the lead.

0:16:48 Ramona Shaw: Even when problems come up, let’s let them be a little bit resourceful. Let them try. You can say, hey, I trust you, got it? Or go figure out a few things and then come back to me and tell me what you’ve tried. Let them learn a bit on their own before you you jumping in because you know you could help. Again, this is like going back to the holding the wheel in the car analogy. When you communicate with clarity and confidence, when you really invest in building trust and respect, then you start to shift your leadership identity.

0:17:21 Ramona Shaw: So as you’ve now listened to this before you move on, just reflect for a moment. What’s one key takeaway that you had here? What’s one thing that really resonated with you and what does that mean for you? What can you do with this information? What can you shift to get out of execution mode? Maybe delegate a task you would typically handle yourself? Reserve some time for strategic thinking, Communicate the vision instead of giving instructions or any of the other things we’ve talked about.

0:17:48 Ramona Shaw: Your growth as a leader ultimately isn’t about working harder, it’s about working differently. So if this episode resonated with you and again, share it, we always love that. But more importantly, check out our masterclass@archova.org masterclass we’ll dive into more of these shifts. We’ll go beyond what we’ve talked about today and why this work matters so much if you want to be successful as a leader today and in the future.

0:18:19 Ramona Shaw: That’s what we got for today’s episode of The Manager Track podcast. Thanks so much. See you next time. If you enjoyed this episode, then check out two other awesome resources to help you become a leader people love to work with. This includes a free masterclass on how to successfully lead as a new manager. Check it out @archova.org/ masterclass. The second resource is my best selling book, the Confident and Competent New Manager.

0:18:45 Ramona Shaw: How to quickly rise to success in your first leadership role. Check it out @archova.org/books or head on over to Amazon and grab your copy there. You can find all those links in the show notes down below.