The Unspoken Truth About Leading Others

I recently had a conversation about leading teams and managing people with a colleague who happens to lead a small team. During this discussion, my colleague made a profound statement which has inspired me to write this piece.

"I struggle managing people because I am afraid to hurt their feelings and lose the friendship."

As I reflected on this, I wondered if anyone had ever prepared my colleague for the challenges of leadership. As the conversation developed, I recalled my experience of graduating from individual contributor to leading my first team of two people nearly two decades ago and wondered if I was really prepared for this task. Looking back, while I feel I successfully managed this transition, there was much I did not know at the time about leading others and managing people. In the twenty years that have followed, I have since grown professionally to lead 9-figure businesses and organizations encompassing hundreds of people. Ironically, even today, I still face many of the same challenges that I faced in my first leadership assignment twenty years ago. The difference is today, unlike back then, I know exactly what to expect and I am much better equipped to handle the unspoken truths of leading others. These are the truths that no one tells new leaders about. These are the truths that, when looking back, I wish I had known when I was transitioning into my first leadership role. I am sure I can say the same for my above referenced colleague. These are the truths that no one speaks of... until now!

Leading others is hard work

When I took on my first team in the early 2000s, no one told me that leading other people would be hard. Maybe I should have known, but up until that point, I had watched my managers lead their teams and it seemed easy. I was wrong. I discovered there were many twists and turns to navigate as a first-time leader.

To start, I learned when leading others, people looked to me for ideas, help, motivation, affirmation, confirmation, direction, pace, support, coaching, reassurance, guidance, mediation, and decisions (to name only a few). I found out that I often needed to switch between these roles at a moment's notice. One minute I might be setting direction. In the next minute, I might be offering support. A minute after that, I could be mediating a dispute or affirming positive performance. It seemed like game of mental ping-pong. At the time, I was not aware that being a leader meant being a part-time psychologist. I remember thinking, "This is hard work; when did leadership and psychology become synonymous?" I have subsequently learned that leading others is all about having a high enough emotional intelligence to understanding the psychology of inspiring and motivating others to contribute their best and simply be their best.

But not all examples of leadership end on a high note. I remember the first time I had to terminate an employee for whom I had a special fondness. It was excruciatingly hard. She was my Executive Assistant and we both jokingly referred to her as my "work wife". She was an awesome assistant and I often gave her responsibilities that extended far beyond those of a typical assistant. Unfortunately, our business at the time was going through a massive turnaround and restructuring effort that required us to cut our workforce nearly in half. The decision to layoff my assistant weighed heavily on me. For months I tried to avoid it. No one prepares you to end the employment of a specially valued employee. When the time came for me to deliver the news to her, I traveled 9,000 miles one-way to tell her in person. That was a difficult day. She and I are still connected here on LinkedIn and have messaged each other a few times over the years. We have never spoken of that dreadful day. Yes, leading others can be hard.

Leading others can be lonely

Over the course of my career, I have also been in situations where leading others can be very lonely. For example, there have been times when I was privy to information regarding cost reductions that I could not share with anyone. In one situation, my parent organization

decided to sell the business I was leading. Of all the members on my team, only my HR and Finance Business Partners were "officially" aware of this intended divestiture. Over time, my other direct reports and even others in my organization came to suspect we were being shopped around. On several occasions, many of them asked me directly if the business was for sale. What do you do in that case? Professional integrity would not allow me to lie to them and say 'no'. Professional ethics would not allow me to confirm their suspicions with a 'yes'. This game of charades with my team and my broader organization went on for almost an entire year. It was a lonely, difficult and challenging year. I remember the three of us who were "over the wall" felt extremely isolated from the balance of our team. This is a part of leading others that no one talks about. And yes, it can be very lonely.

Leading others is a heavy responsibility

I remember the first time I realized I was responsible for the professional productivity, growth and development of others. What a heavy and sobering experience that was. I was now responsible for not only my career, but the careers of others. At the time, I remember thinking what if I get this wrong? What are the consequences? I quickly had to learn to envision a desired future state so that I could create challenging goals and set stretching objectives for my new team. Monitoring and tracking performance was new for me. I had to learn to do it and do it well. Giving developmental (i.e. negative) feedback was also new to me. Where do you learn to do that for the first time? Thankfully, I got it right and my first employees have had much success in their careers. But the weight of coming to grips with this early on, as a first time leader, was enormous.

I mentioned in my opening paragraph that I still face some of the same challenges as an experienced leader that I faced as a first-time leader. Here is an example. I have led turnaround efforts for struggling businesses twice in my career. In both cases, I was keenly aware an entire employee base and hundreds of families were dependent on my success at restoring these businesses to profitability. The realization of knowing the livelihoods for these families were at stake weighed heavily on me, just as realizing for the first time I was responsible for someone else's career. I can recall thinking at various times what would happen to these families if my ideas to save these businesses were wrong and the businesses failed? Would they lose their homes? Their vehicles? Would they be unable to pay college tuition for their children? These are some of questions that ran through my mind at the time. Thankfully, I left both businesses in far better shape than when I inherited them. But if you are going lead others, you must be prepared to take on the responsibility of everyone within your purview - including the families of the people you are leading - they are all depending on you.

The Final Chapter

As a new team leader, I learned very quickly that the buck stopped with me. I was the person who was ultimately responsible for the results of my team. There was no one for me to point to. In fact, everyone pointed at me - my boss, his boss, my peers, my team - everyone. I learned I had to make hard choices. There were many times when I felt isolated. There were many times I felt the "weight of the world". In sharing these unspoken truths about leading others, I in no way wish to discourage anyone from pursuing leadership roles. To the contrary, my aim is to help prepare new leaders to excel in their early leadership assignments.

Leading others is a fun and rewarding experience. But, it is not all glitz and glamour because, while people are an organization's greatest asset, all people are different and have different needs. Thus, leading others has its challenges - many of which are never talked about in leadership circles - not amongst gurus, experts, nor other leaders. I have highlighted three of these 'unspoken truths'. There are others as well. My message is simple. Be aware of them. Get prepared for them. Embrace them. Accept them. Manage them!

Note: You may be wondering what came of my colleague I referenced at the onset of this article who felt they struggled at managing people. To this very day, I continue to serve as coach, mentor, counselor and confidant helping my colleague grow in their leadership journey. All is well on this front.

Thank you for reading my article. The Unspoken Truth About Leading Others is the 27th?article from Dr. Michael Edwards. If you enjoyed it, please subscribe to my Newsletter,?Leadership Explained,?to get notified when I publish a new article. Please 'share' this article with your network, click 'like', and/or leave a comment.?Click 'Follow' if you wish to follow me on LinkedIn. Have a look at my other Leadership Explained articles by clicking here.