For the past two decades, management development programs have been touting the importance of a strengths-based approach. Research by Gallop and a myriad of other groups point to increases in productivity and engagement when we flip the performance-review conversation from fixing our weaknesses to building on our strengths. There’s one problem with this well-intentioned idea: Every strength has an Achilles heel.
Your ability to involve others makes you seem slow to make decisions when time is of the essence. Your deep knowledge makes you a subject matter expert, but overwhelms people with too much detail in the wrong situation. Your drive for results burns people out. Your direct approach comes across as intimidating when you’re under pressure.
The challenge that faces the majority of leaders I work with is how to manage the downsides of their strengths without watering down their overall impact. My solution: Don’t try to work on those weaknesses, delegate them.
At a recent peer coaching session, one of my clients was sharing with the group the progress she was making on her goal of being more lighthearted and approachable at work. One of her towering strengths is her ability to get results. Her style is no-nonsense and direct. Great strengths until she’s under pressure. When that happens, she comes across as being unapproachable and intimidating.
She shared that she had asked one of her direct reports to organize a group team-building day to ease the pressure they were feeling on their quarterly targets. “Basically, I cheated. I delegated my weakness,” she said, laughing.
The reality is that delegating your weakness isn’t cheating, it’s smart. When those weaknesses are the dark underbelly of one of your strengths, it’s time to delegate.
Hire people whose approach is different from your own
A common mistake for many of us is that we hire in our own image. Instead, look for diversity. I work with an executive vice-president of sales whose strength is in creating simplicity. The downside is that he oversimplifies everything, which leads to unrealistic deadlines. Rather than try to get better at creating project plans, he added a member to his team whose strength is digging into the details and surfacing potential issues. Now, the EVP has someone on his team who helps him be more realistic about deadlines, which, in turn, has eased the stress on his team.
Put your weakness on autopilot
It’s much easier to manage the dark side of your strength if you put in place a structure that becomes a regular part of your routine. If your towering strength is coming up with new ideas, the downside might be that you end up overwhelming your team with too many activities and a lack of focus. To counter all this creative energy, end every team meeting with a check-in on the best idea to move forward and which ideas will get sidelined. If you’re terrible at recognition, have the number one item on your team agenda be an appreciation moment. When the dark side of our strength is something that we don’t tend to enjoy doing or simply isn’t top-of-mind, creating a simple repeatable structure will allow you to keep your weakness in check.
Leverage someone else’s strength
As with my client who delegated “fun” to a member of her team, intentionally delegating your weakness to someone else is great way to close your gaps – especially when your weakness is another individual’s strength. A CEO I worked with had very little energy for providing recognition. He appreciated his people, but spent more time thinking about strategy than patting them on the backs. When business was tough, members of his executive team felt undervalued. Seeing the impact on morale, he asked his executive assistant to keep track of team member’s birthdays and work anniversaries. She provided him with greeting cards, which he signed along with a personalized note. The team appreciated the effort and his assistant enjoyed using her organizational skills to execute this component of his recognition plan.
While bringing more of your strengths to work is critically important, managing the invariable downside of those strengths is equally crucial. Delegating your weaknesses is one way to round out your approach to leadership without compromising the strengths that have made you successful.
Glain Roberts-McCabe is founder of The Roundtable, an organization that helps leaders and teams navigate change, disruption and growth.
This column is part of Globe Careers’ Leadership Lab series, where executives and experts share their views and advice about leadership and management. Follow us at @Globe_Careers. Find all Leadership Lab stories at tgam.ca/leadershiplab.
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