Most leaders, were more often than not at one point or another a solid technician in their field. They were good at their job and developed opinions and best practices on how things should be done. This at the core isn’t a bad thing and is a good way to connect with your people and help them build their own careers.
Where this can go wrong is when a leader mistakes what they THINK is the best way to do things…and what ACTUALLY impacts the team negatively. Those are two very different things. They think because the person isn’t doing it the way they did it, then something is wrong and it’s bad. In reality, if the team isn’t noticing it or being impacted by it, there isn’t anything for you to push on…make a suggestion, sure, but it’s not a scorecard item or a place to have a difficult convo.
Leaders are usually worried that because it’s impacting them, it must be impacting the team and they just don’t realize it. I can tell you that most teams, if something is negatively impacting them, you as their leader will hear about it, pretty consistently until the problem is solved. So if you feel something is off, the team’s sentiment is the best place to start. If you aren’t hearing anything about the situation that you are concerned about (and don’t lead them to what you want to hear), then it’s not worth your time or energy.
I hope this is helpful, thanks for being here! Reach out for questions or comments!
