A while back I write a post on my definition of what great leadership should really be all about, and I described this as high-reaching informality. High-reaching because great leaders are ambitious, exceptional at getting the best out of their people, and encouraging their teams to think bigger and aim higher. Informal because this supports open communication, trust, psychological safety, and a culture of healthy disagreement which means better and faster problem solving.
When I think of all the truly great leaders that I’ve worked for and with over the years, these are the two interrelated aspects which have inspired and enabled me to do my best work, and which can combine in a compounding loop. These bosses, as with all effective leaders, were exceptional at adapting their leadership style according to context. They were situationally aware but also self-aware, which enabled them to connect with people in a meaningful but powerful way.
The post became one of my most shared and viewed posts of recent times. People seemed to relate to the bringing together of these very different attributes. But recently I’ve been reflecting on a particularly important element of this concept and something that plays into both of the dimensions: autonomy and ownership.
I wrote quite a bit in my books about the power of autonomy in enabling agility in a fast-moving, complex and uncertain world. Great leaders empower their teams. Micromanaging is terrible for slowing a team’s progress or adaptability. But there’s a real subtlety in how leaders can understand the role of autonomy and once again it’s about context. And here I can offer up two further dimensions which I keep coming back to and which adeptly set the context for empowerment, ownership, and autonomy: confidence and competence.
Competence: this is not just about being skilled enough to do the task, it’s also about being well-informed enough to reliably make good decisions. Because autonomy doesn’t work without situational awareness. Leaders often think about functional skills, but may downplay soft skills.
Confidence: team members may be skilled and informed enough but the team may still make sub-optimal decisions if some members of the team are under-confident. This may well result in poor equality of contribution, dominance by a few team members, people not speaking up when they feel that the course of action is wrong, or simply a lack of confidence in their own skills and how to apply them.
This is why both dimensions are important. The role of the leader is not only to get the best people, but then to set them up for success. It is only through the combination of competence AND confidence that the team can get the most from each person, and that unique knowledge and skills can combine to create an impact greater than the sum of its parts.
The inspiration for these dimensions came from Alice Chapman, who has talked about how they frame an understanding for leaders of when to direct, when to retrain, when to coach, and when to let go. To build on that, these dimensions can also set out a context for leadership styles – when leaders need to lead from the front, when coaching is more appropriate, or working alongside, or when letting go will actually be the thing that gets the best results.
This reminded me of situational leadership, and also Google’s Fowards, Alongside, Behind (FAB) leadership styles. Forwards leadership is about leading from the front and directing (telling rather than selling). Alongside leadership styles are more about guiding, steering, and coaching or even working together to solve problems. Behind leadership is about high autonomy, entrusting teams to make the right decisions because they are both competent and confident in the domain or task at hand.
The subtlety of adapting your leadership style and approach requires a sensitivity to situational context and also enough self-awareness to know what your default or typical leadership response may be.
It’s like the idea of traffic lights and roundabouts. Context is everything. And yet it is so often ignored. In a time of high uncertainty, rapid change and growing complexity, aligned autonomy enables you to move fast, stay adaptable and get the most out of everyone. Its like a superpower.
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