In her seminal book Leadership and the New Science, Dr. Margaret Wheatly compared organizational decision making to the leaves floating down a stream. As each leaf bumps up against another, a rock, or the banks of the waterway, it forces a reorganization of the leaves around it. The same thing is true as other leaves collide. This is similar to the decisions made within an organization.
As a leader, there are thousands of decisions made every day under your watch that you are not even aware of. So how on earth can you guide the direction of the organization when you don’t know what’s going on below you? For new leaders, especially, this can be unnerving.
Take Chuck for example. Chuck has been in the grocery industry for 15 years. Starting out as a cashier at the front-end, he has risen through five different levels including store manager. But in recent months, he’s been promoted to regional vice president, one of six within the organization. Rather than working out of a tiny space in a store, he now has a comfortable office in the headquarters building, although he’s rarely there. He spends most of this time moving from store to store in his region. Truthfully, he has found this rather nerve-racking.
Thankfully, Chuck has been getting some good coaching from a couple of the seasoned leaders within the organization. When I asked him what he’s taken away from these conversations, he told me three things. Number one, you’re no longer a store manager. So if someone asks you a question, refer it to the department head or store manager, even if you know the answer. You don’t want to undermine their authority.
Number two, remember that you are now responsible for vendor relations, community relations, and local politics. In other words, you’re both the promoter and the fixer when it comes to store relations. This is a totally different skillset than being a boss. You won’t lose the boss skills. Just put them in a drawer for now.
Third, keep your eye on the larger context. Every decision you make as a leader can have multiple impacts. When the leader makes a decision, the first question everyone asks is, “How will this affect me?” This includes all the decisions, not just the big ones. It also means your off-hand comment about a policy, a person, the customers or anything else can carry a very long way. So think before you riff.
Finally, have a process for making decisions. Jamie Dimon, for instance, the long-time CEO of J.P. Morgan Chase embraces the OODA Loop model of scenarios when making significant decisions. You can look it up online. Analyzing possible scenarios is really the same as considering how a decision will impact other aspects of organizational function going forward. There are dozens of processes online. Explore them and adopt the one that best suits the kind of decisions you typically make.
While Chuck’s story is specific to the grocery industry, it is easy to extrapolate his experience to manufacturing, distribution, food processing and many other parts of our marketplace. Organizations, in general, exist around different levels of authority and responsibility.
How well does your organization coach leaders, new and experienced on the art and science of thinking three and four steps ahead. Put your ideas in the comments below.