If you are striving to make the shift from management into leadership roles and feel stuck, this ‘tipping point’ in your career offers a unique opportunity to build the self-awareness, understanding, empathy and social skills you need to be an effective leader in today’s world, says Heather Marasse
In everyone’s career there comes a point when you find that everything you have done to get you where you are today, no longer seems to help you in getting to the next level.
It often hits business professionals who are between 35-to-45 years of age and are striving to make the shift from management into leadership roles. They feel stuck. And no matter how hard they work or how much training they undergo, forward momentum starts to stall.
It is precisely at this ‘tipping point’ in your career that offers an opportunity to pause and take stock. It’s time to let go of who you think you are and start inquiring into who you might be. This time in life offers a unique opportunity to build the self-awareness, understanding, empathy and social skills you need to be an effective leader in today’s world.
Throughout my career I’ve coached hundreds of leaders through this tipping point, and I’ve observed there are five distinct stages.
Stage 1: hitting the wall
The first step is to recognise that you are at this tipping point. You’ve probably been working long enough that you’re no stranger to annual performance reviews. Over the years, you may even have come to look forward these discussions of your successes. But suddenly the feedback isn’t always positive. It feels disconfirming. You may feel misunderstood or that the feedback is just plain wrong.
Or, you might have been passed over for a promotion. You notice that new opportunities aren’t coming your way the way they once did, and you feel that your efforts are being overlooked. You may even start to lose a little self confidence. These are all signals that you might be at your tipping point.
A few years ago, one of my clients was building a great career at the director level and had just worked on a project that hit more than a $1 billion USD in sales. He felt on top of the world and expected to make Vice President on the back of this success.
But he didn’t get the promotion. Instead, he was moved laterally. His boss told him, ‘You’re good. But you’re not ready to be a leader.’
He was devastated and felt like a failure. But instead of giving up, he decided to inquire into the feedback. This tipping point started him on a journey of self discovery that has taken him all the way to the C-suite.
Stage 2: identify your success formula
The next step is to pause and examine your own, personal ‘success formula’. We all have a value/currency strategy that brings early success. We learn that we can get what we value most by trading something for it.
For example, what some people value most is to be liked by others, and they will trade in being nice, pleasant and productive while suppressing their own honest feelings about a situation.
Others might value most having the respect of coworkers, and they will trade their time and energy on research so they can always provide the most authoritative advice.
Still others might value being admired above all; they trade in being the best, producing the best results and competing to win in all that they do.
Often, this value/currency proposition can deliver early success, but it becomes less effective over time as you run up against its limits. You’ll try to keep trading more and more of your usual ‘currency’ and you’ll get less and less of what you ‘value’. Getting caught in this loop not only will mask your authenticity, but it will stop you from developing your potential, especially when something important needs to be done.
One leader I coached valued having the respect of his coworkers above all and to do so he tried to always be ‘the smartest guy in the room’. At first, he was respected by his colleagues, but eventually they came to see him as condescending. He left people feeling dismissed and judged, particularly those who reported to him. He found he was losing influence on important decisions and people wanted to leave his team.
Your success formula can be articulated this way:
‘What I value most is _____ and I will trade _____ for it.’ You’ll know you’ve hit upon the right one when it makes you feel vulnerable or uncomfortable.
This formula drives our automatic patterns for dealing with situations and people. Examine how yours has shaped your career (and your life!). You will be amazed by its profound effect.
Stage 3: learn more about yourself
Now that you understand your own success formula, you can take a little closer look at the core motivations along with the inherent gifts and talents that you bring to your work. At Trilogy Effect we use The Enneagram framework to help our clients gain clarity and knowledge of the internal workings of their personalities. It provides a lens through which they become aware of their automatic patterns in thinking and reacting.
You might have heard about the DISC system, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator or other typologies. The Enneagram offers a fresh lens that complements such systems and helps people delve deeper to understand underlying motivations that shape our preferences and patterns.
The Enneagram is comprised of nine distinct personality Types, and for many people the first major ‘AHA!’ moment in working with the Enneagram is the discovery that ‘not everyone thinks the same way I do’. A top leader in the automotive aftermarket industry once told me that going through the Enneagram Typing process was a ‘real eye-opener’. Until then, he had thought that everyone keeps their vulnerabilities to themselves, just like him. He was astounded to learn that this is not everyone’s way of behaving. It was only once he learned to be more open himself, that his team’s full innovation potential was unleashed, and they were able to develop many new products in record time.
Understanding the Enneagram will also take your team’s development to the next level by giving insight into each other’s inner workings.
The head of litigation for one of the world’s biggest biotech companies said that discovering their Enneagram Types was transformational for her whole team because it allowed them to be more thoughtful and strategic in providing feedback and interacting with each other. The improvement in teamwork helped deliver major breakthroughs for her team, and she credits this, in part, with helping her company gain more than 20,000 healthcare patents.
Stage 4: experiment with your formula
Now that you’re aware of how your personality is wired and what your core motivations are, it’s time to experiment with your success formula. Make a list of scenarios where you can see that your habitual approach will likely not deliver the desired outcome and try a different approach. One that challenges your habitual value/currency trade off.
For example, instead of avoiding difficult subjects because you want everyone to like you, tackle the sticky issues head on and learn the value of being truly effective. You may also discover that people still like you!
Instead of being ‘the smartest guy in the room’, learn to hang back and let coworkers talk through challenges and develop an appreciation for others’ ingenuity and creative problem solving.
And instead of being center stage all the time, let others have the spotlight from time to time. By releasing pressure on yourself to perform, you’ll discover new pathways that will bring greater successes.
Stage 5: never stop practicing
Breaking the habits of a lifetime won’t be easy. It takes practice and it is an ongoing journey. Each time you experiment with your success formula, pay close attention to what is happening both externally and internally. You’ll know you’re tapping into unrealised potential if you start to feel uncomfortable. Growth requires discomfort as we break away from our internal patterns. It also takes courage.
You may even experience an ‘authenticity hangover’ where you feel physically unnerved as you practice with a new strategy, but when that happens you know you’re in the right territory. It means that you are tapping into your unrealised potential, and you are tipping into the next phase of your development. This is the price of getting outside of your comfort zone and the payoff is discovering that you have more to offer than you imagined. You are developing your leadership skills and as you get more familiar with this experience, you will be able to guide others to do the same.
Executive Coach Heather Marasse, the managing partner of Trilogy Effect, works with a range of clients, from global Fortune 500 companies to equity-backed small businesses to non-profit organisations. Heather has spent more than 20 years collaborating with clients to develop high-functioning teams, unleash and realise innovation, always with measurable results.
