Empowering Staff, Empowering Yourself

Managers will find themselves, from time to time, in situations where they are ill-prepared, out of the loop, less informed or less articulate than their subordinates, or where subordinates appear to have deeper insights into the issues at hand.  In this Electronic Age, as information travels at breakneck speed to everyone’s desktop, the manager is less able to link her authority to knowledge that only she possesses.

If the manager’s self image is linked to the old paradigm wherein his authority was interdependent with knowledge that he possessed exclusive of his subordinates, then he will be tempted to exclude knowledge from his subordinates, or avoid opportunities for them to share knowledge they have acquired independently.  Worst of all, he may adopt their knowledge without attribution.  We all know managers who have taken a wonderful idea from a subordinate and portrayed it as their own in meetings with the boss. 

None of these ploys will work. Today’ successful managers must be confident decision makers, to be sure.  But most of their interaction with subordinates will be involved in coordinating their staff’s creativity and their contributions to meeting organizational objectives and mission.  In today’s interconnected world it is more likely than ever that a non-manager will produce the most brilliant piece of a strategic plan, or will have the most insightful suggestion about how to deal with an important account.

If managers find their behavior consistent with the older paradigm, what can they do to become successful in the Electronic Age, where managers are more aptly compared to symphony conductors than to generals?  Training can help, especially in a setting where other managers are addressing the same issues.  Increasingly, coaching is available to assist managers to discern and adapt their styles in real time and real issue settings.

More that anything else, managers must learn to live with vulnerability, especially the vulnerability that comes with being not the best informed, not the most knowledgeable and not the wisest.  Here is a very simple first step that a manager can take to become more comfortable with such vulnerability.

Bring a real, but not momentous issue to your subordinates in a staff meeting.  Tell your staff that you are struggling to get your arms around this issue, and that you just don’t seem to be able to resolve it.  Lay it out in some detail, even sharing options that you see but can’t seem to choose among.  Wonder aloud whether anyone has any suggestions.  As staff offer suggestions, listen carefully, ask questions to clarify, take the suggestions seriously and find a way to praise each one.  Do not rush to resolve the issue during that meeting.  Rather spend time showing appreciation for the thoughtful suggestions that have surfaced.

If you find, as you should, that your staff  feel appreciated and empowered by this behavior, you will be emboldened to bring more and more important issues before them.  As you do, they will endow you with even more power.  This is the paradox of sharing one’s vulnerability.  The manager who hides vulnerabilities becomes less powerful in the eyes of his/her subordinates.  S/he who invites subordinates to participate in matters of substance becomes more powerful in their eyes.