Organisations exist to accomplish those things individuals can’t achieve alone. But this creates a new problem — how to coordinate diverse teams so they work together effectively? A big step forward is involving talent in the strategic thinking process, then enabling them to decide how they will turn decisions into action.
The role of the leader is to communicate clearly the resources available to the organisation and when actions need to completed by. However, communication is a two-way process — talent must be allowed to make requests for the resources they need and negotiate feasible timings. Negotiations are a key leadership skill.
Most critically of all, leaders must remain modest about their ability to make detailed plans for teams to execute. A thousand unforeseen issues will arise and talent will need to improvise along the way. They won’t be able to if they’re heads down meeting a plan’s rigid KPIs that their bonuses or promotions depend on.
Agreements
Operations can be divided into parts, with talent tasked to take responsibility for theirs — including developing the connections with others on whom their success depends. The leader’s role is to agree with talent what is expected of them — then give them the space to decide how to do it.
Reaching agreements with talent takes more time than telling them what to do. But if talent is to take accountability we must negotiate openly and not hide behind inflexible targets. We need to give them what they need to succeed — including the flexibility to discover better ways of doing things.
Progress checks should be regular enough to provide timely support, but infrequent enough that talent can focus on outcomes rather than their next status report. If we want extraordinary results, talent needs the freedom to fail and recover without leaders ever losing confidence in them.
The Leader’s Role
Leaders must set one critical boundary: any action talent takes must be on a scale that recovery from failure can be achieved quickly and at minimal cost. If recovery requires leadership involvement or extra resources, leaders must be informed in advance so they can decide whether to take on this risk or not.
As we act, we remain aware, drawing on new information we didn’t have before: what’s working better than expected, or worse? What should we do more of, or less? Are the resources deployed sufficient, and should we redirect some elsewhere?
Leaders orchestrate these multiple lines of action in pursuit of the business’ missions. Those who find this too complex are usually those who waste resources micromanaging how talent performs. They must learn that: leaders lead — talent plays.
Quick Test
If action has stalled on a cross-functional initiative in your organisation, gather the talent involved and ask:
1. What outcomes are you trying to achieve? 2. Are there any issues hindering your efforts? 3. What do each need from the others to move faster?
Then see if they resolve these issues themselves.
What Next?
Tactical choices: who must do what, by when.
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