Speaker 1: Hey, this is Chris with Hacking Your Leadership. On today's
Speaker 1: discussion on employee engagement. I want to talk about the
Speaker 1: importance of making sure that people who want to move
Speaker 1: up with it an organization feel like they can. And
Speaker 1: in a lot of organizations that's harder to do because
Speaker 1: of the number of spots that are available or how
Speaker 1: quickly things move, and it can make some employees you know,
Speaker 1: kind of get dejected about this process, and some of
Speaker 1: them go as far as leading organizations because they feel
Speaker 1: like there isn't a path. There are a lot of
Speaker 1: things that leaders can do to kind of reimagine traditional
Speaker 1: leadership hierarchies because they want to help employees grow, help
Speaker 1: you know, be more flexible or collaborative in the business.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of benefits to doing things like this,
Speaker 1: but the biggest one is what it does for the
Speaker 1: employee experience and the engagement of people who genuinely want
Speaker 1: to promote and move up within an organization. And you
Speaker 1: may not have as much control over you know, how
Speaker 1: quickly that can happen because of the spots available or
Speaker 1: the budget or the you know, people you know getting
Speaker 1: promoted and leaving roles. You know, it can happen at
Speaker 1: varying speeds depending on the organization you're at.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I couldn't agree more. And I think in
Speaker 2: the context of thinking about career progression and opportunities, a
Speaker 2: lot of times what I see is is, uh, we
Speaker 2: get stuck with thinking about how certain roles have to
Speaker 2: hold on to certain authority in decision making or strategy building,
Speaker 2: and we say like, oh, well, now that you're a this,
Speaker 2: you know, a manager, now you're more responsible for executing strategies.
Speaker 2: Or now that you're this and you're leading other managers,
Speaker 2: now you're responsible for building the strategies. And like we
Speaker 2: we we tie these types of tasks and responsibilities to
Speaker 2: a title versus maybe the person versus maybe being creative,
Speaker 2: and how we get all of that work done. There's
Speaker 2: absolutely a level of responsibility that moves with people as
Speaker 2: you move in your career progression for titles. So like,
Speaker 2: you now have this job, here's the responsibilities of this job,
Speaker 2: and you need to do these things. It doesn't mean
Speaker 2: that only you have to do all of these things,
Speaker 2: and it doesn't mean that you don't have to bring
Speaker 2: others along or create spaces of collaboration when it comes
Speaker 2: to some of these things that you're working on. So
Speaker 2: I think that a part of it, when you are
Speaker 2: reimagining kind of the different hierarchies of leadership, A big
Speaker 2: chunk of that is where can we involve others for
Speaker 2: both their ideas, their insights, but also to provide them
Speaker 2: with you know, opportunities to learn and exposure and experience
Speaker 2: and these types of things, like where do those spaces exist?
Speaker 2: Where are those decisions where they have to be made
Speaker 2: by the person who hasn't response in the role. Then
Speaker 2: where can these decisions be made maybe more collectively and
Speaker 2: and and even if that person has to make the decision,
Speaker 2: how can that how can that person create a space
Speaker 2: where they can you know, collaborate and open up some
Speaker 2: of that decision to others before they make it. So
Speaker 2: I think that a lot of that has to be done,
Speaker 2: you know, for to reimagine some of the like the
Speaker 2: more traditional things that have always happened over the years.
Speaker 2: We've got to get better and knowing that maybe the
Speaker 2: leader has the responsibility and the ownership of the decision,
Speaker 2: but getting to that decision, who they include, how they
Speaker 2: create space for it, how they how they provide others
Speaker 2: the opportunity to idate in those spaces I think is
Speaker 2: going to be critical.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think you're spot on with that. A person
Speaker 1: a leader can absolutely be ultimately the person who is
Speaker 1: accountable to a specific outcome or a process or the
Speaker 1: execution of a strategy, while still delegating the work itself
Speaker 1: to other people in a way that that gives them,
Speaker 1: that makes them a part of it, the leadership hierarchy. Uh,
Speaker 1: even if it's just temporary or you know, for for
Speaker 1: a project or a role, without it being a permanent thing,
Speaker 1: as long as the person you know knows what's going
Speaker 1: on and they they understand the score when it comes
Speaker 1: to what their what their role is, you know, sometimes
Speaker 1: it can be the only way to let a person
Speaker 1: have the experience they need to be able to find
Speaker 1: out if they want to move into a leadership role
Speaker 1: or you know, what they want their you know, future
Speaker 1: with the organization to be. So I want to go
Speaker 1: over a few things that leaders can do to do
Speaker 1: this the right way without, you know, without promising too
Speaker 1: much to an employee that they don't have the ability
Speaker 1: to follow up on. Also without making making it seem
Speaker 1: like it's window dressing, and that and that what they're
Speaker 1: doing actually, you know, has has positive outcomes from a
Speaker 1: standpoint of career growth and development. But first, I want
Speaker 1: to get up toward to one of our sponsors. Right
Speaker 1: If you're a leader of people and you're trying to
Speaker 1: figure out the right way to give people the experience
Speaker 1: and the work that they need in order to ensure
Speaker 1: that they have what it takes to continue to move
Speaker 1: up within the organization, even if there isn't necessarily a
Speaker 1: spot available right now. It's important to keep in mind
Speaker 1: two things when it comes to the work that you're choosing. One,
Speaker 1: you need to level set with the employee on what
Speaker 1: their goals are so that when you are assigning work
Speaker 1: or delegating work that might be outside their normal scope,
Speaker 1: that that work will help bring the learnings and the
Speaker 1: experience and the skills that they would need to go
Speaker 1: into that next step or that next role that they
Speaker 1: that they want to do. It does no help for
Speaker 1: the employee at all if the things you're delegating are
Speaker 1: not related to what that next step is that they
Speaker 1: want in their career. If this is what they've kind
Speaker 1: of raised their hand and said, I want to move up,
Speaker 1: you know, giving them kind of busy work is not development.
Speaker 1: That's just you know, kind of putting things off of
Speaker 1: your plate on theirs. And then the second thing is
Speaker 1: you have to make sure that when the employee is
Speaker 1: doing this role, even if it's temporary, that the employee
Speaker 1: truly feels like they are in this role. So if
Speaker 1: it's a a mentorship spot or if it's a temporary,
Speaker 1: you know, position on the leadership team to kind of
Speaker 1: grow and develop there, it can't be kind of leadership light.
Speaker 1: It can't be Okay, well, they're remember the leadership team,
Speaker 1: but we're not going to do these things or these
Speaker 1: things with them. It's they can be involved in this thing,
Speaker 1: but not that thing. It's like, no, if you want
Speaker 1: them to truly take the most out of it, they
Speaker 1: need to feel the weight of that position on their shoulders,
Speaker 1: and they won't feel the weight of that position on
Speaker 1: their shoulders if they don't feel like they're being treated
Speaker 1: as that role at every turn. That's the only way
Speaker 1: to truly prepare them for that role if they want
Speaker 1: to go into it eventually, and it's the only way
Speaker 1: to make it make them not kind of feel patronized
Speaker 1: or like that you're kind of throwing a bone to
Speaker 1: them for the moment, because you want them to stop
Speaker 1: complaining about trying to get promoted. No, you truly believe
Speaker 1: this is some thing they could do if they wanted to.
Speaker 1: They want to do it. Now, let's see if the
Speaker 1: if the skills are there, or if the skills need
Speaker 1: to be developed before a permanent role can be can
Speaker 1: be kind of offered.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that you kind of talked through about,
Speaker 2: like the the totality of you know, the whether it's
Speaker 2: the delegation or the empowerment to someone, like if you're
Speaker 2: going to do something that that's created for somebody to
Speaker 2: have an experience and to actually feel, to your point,
Speaker 2: the weight of the responsibility they have to have that.
Speaker 2: You know, you can't just say I'm gonna you know,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna ask you to make these decisions, Chris, Like
Speaker 2: you're you're in charge of make a decision here. Also,
Speaker 2: if it goes bad, don't worry about it. If it
Speaker 2: goes good, I'll take all the credit, you know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying, Like, that's not how this is gonna work.
Speaker 1: Right now.
Speaker 2: You've got to feel the weight of that. If you're
Speaker 2: truly going to create a space that's about like learning
Speaker 2: and development and providing something that is breaking the hierarchy
Speaker 2: of what's typically there. It has to be done with intention,
Speaker 2: and it has to be done kind of like all
Speaker 2: in on whatever that's going to be as much as
Speaker 2: you can within the control, you know. I mean, there
Speaker 2: are going to be things that as a leader only
Speaker 2: you can do, and decisions that only you can make.
Speaker 2: But there is a lot of space to play typically
Speaker 2: in getting to that point. And that's where you can
Speaker 2: bring people along and start to start to give some
Speaker 2: of that authority away from a decision making standpoint, and
Speaker 2: that provides the opportunity for people to build their own
Speaker 2: confidence in the decisions they're making and preparing them for
Speaker 2: what's next as they elevate their own career.
Speaker 1: Right. And the last thing I'll say about this I
Speaker 1: think it's important is it will come with failures. Meaning
Speaker 1: I don't mean person as a whole fails. I mean
Speaker 1: the person will have individual failures based on decisions they make,
Speaker 1: or interactions they have, or relationships that need to improve
Speaker 1: that they didn't improve on. You know, those little failures
Speaker 1: are necessary for a person to feel the weight of
Speaker 1: the position. The weight of the position isn't felt through
Speaker 1: the good times. It's not felt through the you know, Oh,
Speaker 1: I have the authority and I can tell you what
Speaker 1: to do, and I'm doing these projects and i'm I'm
Speaker 1: I feel like i'm you know, unleashing myself to you know,
Speaker 1: go to that next level. That's not where the weight
Speaker 1: of the position is felt. The weight is felt in
Speaker 1: making decisions that have real implications on relationships with people,
Speaker 1: and how you navigate those decisions in a way that
Speaker 1: shows what your values are and that maintains the relationship
Speaker 1: without sacrificing your values. That's what the leadership opportunity is
Speaker 1: for that person, and so it will come with failures
Speaker 1: if they've ever been in a role like that before,
Speaker 1: and it's important to allow them to have those failures
Speaker 1: so that they can fix them on their own, on
Speaker 1: their own terms. If you're not doing that, then they're
Speaker 1: going to feel like there's a big safety that underneath
Speaker 1: them and they won't get as much out of the position.
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us in this episode about employe engagement.
Speaker 1: I will see you next Thursday for the next one.
Speaker 1: You have a great day,