Speaker 1: Helping leaders motivate their people to a higher level of
Speaker 1: performance through strong human relations, team building, and Gola giving.
Speaker 1: This is the seven Minute Leadership Podcast with your host
Speaker 1: Paul Fellovledo.
Speaker 2: Hello everyone, and welcome to the seven Minute Leadership Podcast.
Speaker 2: It's episode six point fifty three. Leadership has a strange
Speaker 2: trap hidden inside it. The better you are at solving problems,
Speaker 2: the more problems people bring to you. At first, it
Speaker 2: feels like a compliment. Your team trusts you, they rely
Speaker 2: on your experience, they believe you have the answers. And
Speaker 2: then one day you realize something uncomfortable. You're not leading
Speaker 2: a team anymore. You're running a help desk. Every issue,
Speaker 2: every decision, every small obstacle flows upward to your desk.
Speaker 2: Someone's computer problem, someone's schedule and conflict, a disagreement between
Speaker 2: two employees, a question about a policy that already exists
Speaker 2: in the handbook. You spend your day putting out fires
Speaker 2: that should never have reached you. If that sounds familiar,
Speaker 2: there is an important leadership shift waiting for you. Your
Speaker 2: job is not to solve every problem. Your job is
Speaker 2: to build a team that solves its own problems. Let's
Speaker 2: talk about how that actually works. First, you have to
Speaker 2: stop being the fastest problem solver in the room. This
Speaker 2: is hard for experienced leaders. When someone brings you a problem,
Speaker 2: your instinct is to fix it immediately. You know the
Speaker 2: answer and you can resolve it in thirty seconds. But
Speaker 2: every time you do that, you accidentally train your team
Speaker 2: to bring you the next problem too. Speed feels productive,
Speaker 2: in reality, it creates dependence. When someone walks into your
Speaker 2: office with a problem, try this simple response. Instead, ask
Speaker 2: them one question, what do you think we should do now?
Speaker 2: The conversation changes. Instead of handing the problem upward, they
Speaker 2: start thinking about it themselves. They might pause, they might
Speaker 2: struggle for a moment. That silence is actually leadership development
Speaker 2: happening in real time. Second, normalize problem ownership. Too many
Speaker 2: organizations teach employees to escalate issues immediately. The culture becomes
Speaker 2: take it to the boss. That culture kills initiative. Instead,
Speaker 2: build a rule that problems should be worked at the
Speaker 2: lowest possible level before they move upward. Encourage your team
Speaker 2: to talk to each other first. Encourage them to try solutions.
Speaker 2: Encourage them to collaborate before escalation becomes necessary. When employees
Speaker 2: know they are expected to think first, and escalate. Second,
Speaker 2: something powerful happens the team becomes smarter. Third, give people
Speaker 2: permission to make small mistakes. A team cannot solve its
Speaker 2: own problems if they're terrified of getting it wrong. If
Speaker 2: every decision carries the risk of punishment, people will avoid
Speaker 2: decisions entirely. They will push everything upward to leadership because
Speaker 2: it feels safer. You have to send a different message.
Speaker 2: It's okay to make a decision. It's okay to experiment.
Speaker 2: It's ok to try something that does not work the
Speaker 2: first time. A healthy team learns through action, not hesitation. Fourth,
Speaker 2: teach the difference between problems in decisions. This sounds simple,
Speaker 2: but it changes everything. Many issues brought to leaders are
Speaker 2: not actually problems. They are decisions waiting to be made.
Speaker 2: For example, someone might say, we have a scheduling issue
Speaker 2: that sounds like a problem. Often it simply means to
Speaker 2: options exist and someone needs to choose one. Leaders who
Speaker 2: teach their teams how to recognize decisions create momentum. Instead
Speaker 2: of waiting for instructions, employees start choosing the best available path.
Speaker 2: Fifth reward initiative loudly when someone solves a problem without
Speaker 2: your involvement, celebrate it, mention it in a meeting, send
Speaker 2: a quick message thanking them for stepping up. Recognition reinforces behavior.
Speaker 2: If employees see initiative being praised, they start looking for
Speaker 2: opportunities to demonstrate it. The goal is simple. You want
Speaker 2: a team that does not freeze when something goes wrong.
Speaker 2: You want a team that looks at a challenge and says,
Speaker 2: let's figure this out. Because here's the truth about leadership
Speaker 2: that many people learn the hard way. If your organization
Speaker 2: depends on you for every solution, your leadership sealing is
Speaker 2: extremely low. You become the bottleneck. Growth slows down, innovation
Speaker 2: slows down, decisions take longer, and stress rises. On the
Speaker 2: other hand, when you build a team that thinks, collaborates,
Speaker 2: and solves problems together, everything starts to accelerate. Your organization
Speaker 2: becomes stronger than any single leader. So let me leave
Speaker 2: you with one practical challenge today. The next time someone
Speaker 2: brings you a problem, resist the urge to immediately solve it. Instead,
Speaker 2: ask three questions, what do you think the real problem is?
Speaker 2: What options have you considered? What solution would you try first?
Speaker 2: Those three questions turn a complaint into a leadership conversation.
Speaker 2: They also turn employees into problem solvers. Over time, something
Speaker 2: remarkable starts to happen. People stop coming to you with
Speaker 2: every little issue. They start coming to you with solutions.
Speaker 2: And that is the moment you know your leadership is working.
Speaker 2: Because the strongest teams are not the ones with the
Speaker 2: smartest leader. The strongest teams are the ones where everyone
Speaker 2: is thinking. So if you want to become a stronger leader,
Speaker 2: start by asking better questions. Start by giving your team
Speaker 2: space to think, decide, and solve. The organizations that move
Speaker 2: fastest are not the ones with leaders who have all
Speaker 2: the answers. They are the ones where everyone is thinking
Speaker 2: and everyone is stepping forward. This has been the seven
Speaker 2: minute Leadership podcast, and I thank you for listening.
Speaker 1: For more Paul Fell of Alito Podcasts, visit paulfellowalito dot com.