The middle leaders are perhaps the most important part of an organization. They both serve and lead and without these leaders, the ability to get things done becomes hazy at best. As you lead down to your team or customers and across to your peers, it’s important to lead up to your leaders as well. That concept may seem a little odd in your organization, but whether they realize it or not, they need you to leverage your full circle of leadership to impact the organization.
Here are some tips and strategies as you lead and influence your leader.
Lead yourself well
To say that leading yourself well is a fundamental way to influence and lead up to your leader may seem a bit elementary. Do your job well, doesn’t feel like groundbreaking advice! Willie Mays, a Hall of Fame American baseball player said, “It isn’t hard to be good from time to time in sports. What’s tough is being good every day.” When you are that consistent, get-the-job-done-well, type of person and leader, you are actually helping and influencing your leader in a major way – you are preventing them from having to lift your load.
Most leaders dislike or even hate inconsistencies in performance or output because they never know what they are going to get. I realized this leadership preference early on and dedicated myself to being a person who got things done consistently and with quality. As a seasoned leader, I loved my consistent leaders. It was always a joy to walk in and see them because they were so consistent. It gave us more time to celebrate the team and spend time on other things like personal and professional development.
Leading yourself, and your team, well helps you not only stand out but opens the door to influence and lead your leader.
Lifting the load
As you get to know your leader, a helpful way to influence them is the ability to anticipate what your leader may want or need. It’s good to, and perhaps quicker at times, to have a little bit of courage and ask them if you can’t anticipate the need yourself yet. When you are leading yourself well, they will be happy to tell you how you can help them.
I remember two points in time I had with a previous leader. I was leading a big acquisition project in the state of California and in he came, like a sudden thunderstorm unleashed on an unexpecting town, “Change this, change that. I don’t like this….” People were shocked. I was shocked! It was one of the first times that I was truly speechless. Now, none of the many things he wanted changed impacted the work of completing the acquisition itself, but it did mean doing a lot of rework to suit his needs and style. After taking a moment from the setback, I took some time to understand why he wanted the changes that he did. A couple of weeks later as we toured the state, I had tuned my leaders into the change and we were all anticipating his new direction. The result was that my influence on him went high very quickly and others were slower to adapt to his vision and communication style.
Lifting a leader’s load also gets you noticed. Do it once or twice and you’ll get a thanks. Do it several times and they will come to you for help. Do it continuously and they will often seek out ways to help you. Don’t forget that how you go about lifting and carrying the load is often more important than how big the actual lift is
Knowing when to push and when to pull back
Obviously, a big part of leading up to your leader is influencing action, direction prioritization as you push through new challenges and strategies. A person who leads up well understands that there is an optimal window of opportunity to push something forward and has a good idea of when to strike the conversation up. The subject matter, what’s going on in the business, and what’s currently taking up your leader’s attention are some of the larger factors to determine the best time to push something through or an indicator of when to pull back. Here are some self-reflection questions that are a good indication that you need to push it forward to your leader
- Do I hold critical information that my leader needs to know? Do you know of something that would be vitally important for your leader to know as they execute their role? Check yourself here to have the self-awareness to know if it’s something that is truly vital for them to know or something that just impacts or is of interest to you.
- Is time running out? Those who are good with time management and strategy skills are often afforded a look into the future that others will miss. What’s critical that has a short runway to complete or a pass or fail deadline quickly approaching? If proper attention and prioritization are not already on the subject, that’s a strong indicator that it’s time to push.
- Have you hit, or gone past, your capacity? Your leader doesn’t want you to be burned out. They want you to be an effective leader who is performing well in the role and enjoying the work. Let them know when you hit your limits so they can help you prioritize work, protect other items from hitting your to-do list, and provide extra resources to get things done.
Here are some indicators and subjects to know when to pull back.
- Is this my personal agenda? Is the subject that you are trying to push good for the business or does it mainly benefit yourself? It’s also good to check the subject against your passion areas and biases. Sometimes those do align and what you are passionate about absolutely aligns with that needs to be pushed forward, but it can also become a blinder to what needs to be brought forward.
- Is the timing right only for me? As you think about what you want to push forward, think of it in relation to the full slate of things that are going on and are coming up. If it rubs up against other priorities, it may be best to wait until the timing opens up for everyone.
- Is the request bigger than the relationship? Relationship equity is like financial equity that builds value over time. Think about a big ask that you had with a leader whom you had a very strong relationship with. Would that ask go over as well during the first month that you knew them? Probably not. Reflect on your current relationship when thinking about a big ask with your leader. Does the relationship support the ask? If not, it may be best to pull back for now or rethink the ask in a more manageable way.
I truly loved my roles where I had established a great working relationship with my leader and was influencing through them to make some really fun and exciting things happen. Lead up to your leader to open up new opportunities for yourself, and the team while elevating your leader to be even more effective with others.
Make a better tomorrow.
-ZH
