How to Handle a Self-Interested Leader | 120 Seconds to Better Leadership
*Video Transcription*
So, I want to flip the script just a little bit today and do a little bit of crowdsourcing. I’ve been coaching (or consulting at least) for 20 years, and I don’t get stumped that often, which is part of why I love my job. There are lots of hard problems to solve, but I get to work with really smart clients, and so usually between the two of us, I feel like we can come up with some pretty creative answers to their problems.
The session I’m going to talk about today is one of the first that I can remember where at the end I was like, “I’ve got nothing else for you to think about that you haven’t tried”. So, here’s the situation, and here’s where I’d love to do some crowdsourcing.
Leading people who act out of self-interest is very difficult.
People that tend to always think about, “Hey, I want this promotion, I want that job, I want that office, I want to collaborate with that person” – people who are just constantly asking for more for themselves can be pretty exhausting for their managers.
There are a few things that I ask about when someone is behaving this way. One thing is, have they gotten the feedback? Because, in my experience, nine times out of ten they’ve only gotten about four percent of the feedback. So, that’s usually where I’ll start with clients: “We need to think about the information they’ve gotten from you. Do they even know this? Are they aware, or is this a blind spot?”
But in this case, I know the leader quite well. There is zero chance the person they’re managing has not gotten 100% of the feedback they need. This leader is wonderful, is a super great people guy, and is very, very direct, which is my favorite.
I also ask about the relative age of the person who’s being managed. If you’re talking about a 23-year-old who’s fresh out of college or a 25-year-old who just got their MBA, it’s not surprising that they think they’re on fire and they want it all. You would expect some of that immature thinking. That often looks like acting out of self-interest, but it’s just because the person is young, and they need to calibrate to the expectations of other people in the corporation.
So, that can be a maturity issue. I take that into account.
But in this case, we’re talking about someone who’s nearly 40. That, to me, is more of a red flag than someone who’s young and perhaps still immature. So, that wasn’t the problem either.
The way that self-interest showed up is that she was not a good people-leader. And her performance has been sort of hit or miss. And even though her people were underperforming, even though she was on a performance improvement plan, she was still asking for a promotion that she wasn’t eligible for (it was going to be several years until she was). So, a bit of a perception gap, there, too.
What has worked with this person is pressure. When she’s gotten negative feedback on the performance of her direct reports, she has engaged much more as a people leader. But then, when her people start to improve, the first thing she does is use that as evidence of why she should get promoted.
So, there’s still a real disconnect there in terms of how she sees herself in this organization.
Now my clients, for the most part, have to come up with their own ideas – but of course, after 20 years I’ve seen some other people’s good ideas, so I always share those as well.
And we’d crossed off all the categories under carrots and sticks.
Has she been asked to focus on shared objectives? Yes. Has she been given visibility opportunities? Yes, she’s been given visibility opportunities. Is she being recognized for improvement? Yes, yes, yes. This guy (the leader) is very good at that.
The sticks are the performance improvement plan and also the feedback, which I know has been quite direct. And the other stick is that, no, she’s not been promoted.
They’ve not really resorted to anything else yet, and I don’t think that’s warranted. But we went through all the carrots and sticks that I could think of and all the ones that my leader could. (The examples above aren’t exhaustive, just a summary of what we talked about.)
And my leader is like, “Yeah, none of that’s worked.” And it’s been years.
And here’s the other thing that’s important, I think, to assess about this situation. I asked the question, “How much energy or time is she taking relative to her peers?”
And he said, “Thank goodness, her peers are really strong. She’s getting 10 times more at least than anyone on my team.”
He’s got a large team, so good thing they’re not all like that!
So, the problem is that she’s taking an inordinate amount of energy, time, and space out of the organization. And she’s an okay performer – she’s improving on people leadership – but at the end of the day she’s still always acting in self-interest, at least to the extent that we can tell.
My question is, what didn’t we come up with? What have you used in other situations?
I know, for me, I’ve had people that are this way on my team, and how I handle them depends a lot on how talented they are. If they’re brilliant, I’ll tolerate more than if they’re marginal; if they’re marginal, they’re never going to make it. Sometimes I’m willing to trade energy for brilliance. I just am.
But I’m curious what you’ve seen work, what you’ve seen not work, and what ideas you have.
Shoot me a message on LinkedIn and let me know - https://www.linkedin.com/in/emilybermes/
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