Ok, the blog is going to be wicked short today. It’s late, and I’ve been busy taking on roles that don’t belong to me.
All around us, we can find examples of people forgetting what their role is at work. Our global politics is full of examples of what happens when a leader forgets the true purpose of their position – they forget what, exactly, they were hired by their citizens to do. Not good.
But you don’t have to be playing a real-life game of Risk to start blurring the lines between what you’re supposed to be doing with your time at work and what you think is needed during your time at work.
You know what I mean here. Usually, when we start to move out of our job and into someone else’s, we’re doing it with good intentions. We don’t mean to take over the creative design process, we’re just helping the team find their way forward. We don’t mean to micro-manage someone, we just want to be sure that they succeed.
None of that is good. It’s not good for you – you have a job you’re not doing while you’re doing someone else’s job. And it’s not good for them either – because you rob them of the chance to rise to a challenge and grow.
I know someone who is very good at helping without hurting. He delegates. He let’s people flounder. He quietly works on the side to find solutions so that when they finally come to him for help, he can offer the correct insight without actually doing the job for them. Yeah, he puts a lot of thought and effort into what he does, but the people he delegates to become better and better.
Here’s the kicker. This guy? Has no direct reports.
You heard me. He’s delegating sideways and growing his peers. That’s not quite his role but that’s the role he wants.
So today at work, think about the role you have, the role you want and what role you should drop.