Why we need to rethink whom we promote into leadership positions
We (people in general) commonly misinterpret displays of confidence as a sign of competence. When it comes to leadership, manifestations of hubris — often masked as charisma or charm — are commonly mistaken for leadership potential.
So, arrogance and overconfidence are inversely related to leadership talent — the ability to build and maintain high-performing teams, and to inspire followers to set aside their selfish agendas in order to work for the common interest of the group.
In short: what it takes to get the job is not just different from, but also the reverse of what it takes to do the job well. As a result, too many incompetent people are promoted to management jobs and promoted over more competent people.
In most organizational hierarchies, there is a tendency for every employee to rise in the hierarchy through promotion until they reach a level of respective incompetence.
For example, a front-office secretary who is quite good at her job may thus be promoted to executive assistant to the CEO for which she is not trained or prepared for — meaning that she would be more productive for the company (and likely herself) if she had not been promoted.
This is called the Peter Principle.
The Peter Principle is thus based on the logical idea that competent employees will continue to be promoted, but at some point will be promoted into positions for which they are incompetent, and they will then remain in those positions because of the fact that they do not demonstrate any further competence that would get them recognized for additional promotion.
According to the Peter Principle, every position in a given hierarchy will eventually be filled by employees who are incompetent to fulfill the job duties of their respective positions.
Most people won’t turn down a promotion, especially if it comes with greater pay and prestige — even if they know they are unqualified for the position.
The reason why they then stay in those positions is that once an employee reaches a position in which they are incompetent, they are no longer evaluated based on their output but instead are evaluated on input factors, such as arriving at work on time and having a good attitude.
Dr. Peter further argued that employees tend to remain in positions for which they are incompetent because mere incompetence is rarely sufficient to cause the employee to be fired from the position. Ordinarily, only extreme incompetence causes dismissal.
The result is that every position in a given hierarchy will eventually be filled by employees who are incompetent to fulfill the job duties of their respective positions.
This is mostly the case with people being promoted to management positions. Because those positions naturally have more impact on the business, it’s worth reconsidering how we assess leadership capabilities.
Rethinking how we view leadership
Most people begin their careers by developing expertise in a technical, functional, or professional domain. If you had all the right answers it meant you were doing a good job and promotion was headed your way. Eventually leading to a people management position where you know what needs to be done, teach people how to do it and evaluate their performance. A command and control model that is now outdated.
What worked in the past is no longer a guarantee to what will work in the future.
We need managers who give support and guidance rather than instructions. Their new job is to draw energy, creativity, and learning out of the people with whom they work.
Increasingly, coaching is becoming integral to the fabric of a learning culture — a skill that good managers at all levels need to develop and deploy.
An effective manager-as-coach asks questions instead of providing answers, supports employees instead of judging them, and facilitates their development instead of dictating what has to be done.
Unlocking people’s potential to maximize their own performance.
In Daniel Goleman’s classic study of leadership styles, published in The Harvard Business Review in 2000, leaders ranked coaching as their least-favorite style, saying they simply didn’t have time for the slow and tedious work of teaching people and helping them grow.
So how do you make people more open to a coaching kind of leadership style?
Start by explaining WHY it is valuable for the business and their own success.
For example, as a manager, you are likely to have the occasional one-on-one conversation with people from your team.. These are conversations that have a huge impact on that person and also on the manager for that matter. This new leadership style is to help you acquire the skills to maximize value in those conversations, to unlock previously hidden issues, to uncover new options, and to reveal fresh insights.
Embrace coaching yourself if you want people you work with to embrace it, lead by example.
Move to a growth mindset where everybody in the company is open to constant learning and risk-taking. More on cultivating a growth mindset in your organization in this article.
The change you are aiming for is that the leaders from the company shift from being know-it-alls to being learn-it-alls.
On a final note, we wanted to share this chart with you.
Note that it is not about vision, charisma or command and control. It has way more similarities with a coach-leadership approach.
Taken together, these attributes are all about creating a safe and trusting environment. A leader with high ethical standards conveys a commitment to fairness, instilling confidence that both they and their employees will honor the rules of the game. Similarly, when leaders clearly communicate their expectations, they avoid blindsiding people and ensure that everyone is on the same page. In a safe environment, employees can relax, invoking the brain’s higher capacity for social engagement, innovation, creativity, and ambition.
