Have you become your team’s bottleneck? (#307)

The Confident Leader

BOOST YOUR LEADERSHIP IN UNCERTAIN TIMES

Chris, a COO, sat in his office at 9pm redoing a deck his director had already finished, telling himself it just needed a touch before it went out.

He wasn’t angry at his team, he just couldn’t shake the feeling that if it wasn’t done a certain way, it wasn’t going to be right.

“Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.” – George S. Patton

This Week’s Edition

What’s the real cost of your high standard? 

Clarify Your Thinking

For Chris, the danger was never that the work would slip. He would make sure of that. 

The problem was that nothing moved forward unless it moved through him.

Perfectionism doesn’t always look like stalling. Sometimes it looks like a leader who does everything, fixes everything, touches everything. 

Also, let’s recognize that the leader doesn’t refer to it as perfectionism. We call it high standards. 

Listen more closely to the voice underneath:

“If I want it done right, I have to do it myself.”

That voice isn’t protecting the quality. It’s protecting you from the discomfort of watching someone do it differently than you would, and maybe a little worse, on the way to doing it well.

So what do we do? We take it back. We redo the deck. We rewrite the email. 

It feels productive, but at what cost? 

Old Thinking: If I want it done right, I have to do it myself.

New Thinking: If I want leverage, I let them do it at eighty percent and coach the rest.

Thoughts Lead to Actions

This isn’t actual leadership. This is doing. 

And guess what? Tomorrow it lands on your desk again, because you taught them it always will.

True leadership leverage is letting someone else do it at eighty percent, and you coach them to ninety.

Doing it all yourself isn’t a high standard. It’s a bottleneck with your name on it, and you fix it by catching yourself before you take the work back.

Here are the Power Questions to ask the next time something lands on your desk that shouldn’t:

1. Does this actually need me, or does it just need to meet my exact preference?
2. If they did this at eighty percent, what would truly break, and what would just be different than mine?
3. Am I about to coach this person, or quietly redo their work and tell myself it’s faster?
4. What does it cost me, all year, to be the only one who can do this?
5. If I keep doing this myself, what am I teaching them to stop trying?

Chris handed the next deck back with three specific notes instead of fixing it at 9pm. 

It was hard, as he had to sit with the discomfort of letting it go out “good” rather than perfectly.

Think this…let it be eighty percent in their hands. Coach the twenty. That’s how you stop being the bottleneck and start being the leader.

Boost Your Performance

Want to stop being the bottleneck on your own team? This week’s video shows you where to start.

What’s Your Opinion?

What’s one thing on your plate right now that only you do, and what would it actually cost to let someone else do it at eighty percent?

I’d love to hear your thoughts: robin.pou@robinpou.com

If you are going to be a leader, you might as well be a good one. Don’t let doubt count you out. Have a confident week!

Robin Pou, Chief Advisor and Strategist

We live to make bad leadership extinct so forward this newsletter to others who strive to be confident leaders. 

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What is “The Confident Leader”?

During the Covid-19 Pandemic, I began a video series called “Panic or Plan?” It was designed to equip leaders to navigate the doubt they experienced and to rise in the confidence they needed to lead during turbulent times. It took off. I then started this newsletter to equip leaders in the same fashion each week for the doubt that crash