ACCIDENTAL DIMINISHER
ARE Science
YOU AN Of
ACCIDENTAL
The
Great Conversation
DIMINISHER?
BY LIZ WISEMAN
GREGORY PAL hired Michael, a talented
individual with rich foreign trade experience,
to help his renewable energy company’s
efforts to expand rapidly into Brazil. But in
an effort to help Michael, Gregory would
often jump in to solve problems. Because
Michael was still new, Gregory gave him the
easy assignments and piecemeal tasks that
were not suited for someone like Michael with
highly developed skills. Then, because Michael
was the only team member working remotely,
Gregory would often end up representing him
in meetings. After a few months, Michael was
using just 20 to 25 percent of his talent on the
job.
DIMINISHERS VS. MULTIPLIERS
Michael’s case is hardly an isolated one.
In fact, it illustrates an all-too-common
workplace phenomenon, leadership poorly
exercised. Consider these two questions:
Have you ever worked for a leader who
underutilized your talent or made you question
your own intelligence? Or, have you worked
for a leader who drew on every ounce of your
brainpower and even made you smarter and
more capable?
We call the first type of leader a Diminisher
and the second type a Multiplier. Diminishers
tend to assume that “people will never figure
this out without me,” while Multipliers believe
“people are smart and will figure it out.”
After analyzing data from more than 200
leaders across four continents, our research
showed that most managers underestimate
how widely employees’ talent is underutilized.
When we began, we expected that Multipliers
would get more from their people. However,
we were surprised by just how much more
they actually received: Multipliers accessed
employees’ capabilities 1.97 times more than
Diminishers, nearly twice as much. In other
words, leaders who are Multipliers essentially
double the intellectual power of their
workforce at no incremental cost.
Imagine what your organization would
be like if everyone led like a Multiplier,
successfully enabling the team to apply the
full range of its intelligence and depth of
capabilities? The problem, however, is that
most leaders think they are getting more from
their people than they really are.
Liz Wiseman
THE ACCIDENTAL DIMINISHER
While the stereotypical Diminisher is the
tyrannical bully and know-it-all, it turns out
that Diminishers actually aren’t all jerks,
and some are really good people. While the
narcissistic leaders grab the headlines, the
vast majority of diminishing happening inside
our workplaces is done by the Accidental
Diminisher — managers with the best of
intentions, good people who think they are
doing a good job leading.
How might we, with the very best intentions,
be having a diminishing impact on the people
we lead? Can people be hindered by our honest
attempts to help, teach or lead by example?
Here are five signs that you might be
accidentally diminishing your people.
1. You set the pace for your team. You
believe managers should lead by
example, and you expect others to
follow your lead. But when leaders set
the pace, they are more likely to create
spectators than followers.
2. You’ve got the gift of the gab. You
are passionate and articulate and can
Liz Wiseman teaches leadership to executives and emerging leaders
around the world. She is the President of The Wiseman Group, a leadership
research and development firm headquartered in Silicon Valley. Some of her
recent clients include: Apple, Disney, eBay/PayPal, Facebook, GAP, Google,
Microsoft, Nike, Roche, Salesforce.com and Twitter. Liz has been listed on
the Thinkers50 ranking and named as one of the top 10 leadership thinkers
in the world and recipient of the 2016 ATD Champion of Talent Award.
She is the author of three best-selling books: Rookie Smarts: Why
Learning Beats Knowing in the New Game of Work, Multipliers:
How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter and The
Multiplier Effect: Tapping the Genius Inside Our Schools.
thewisemangroup.com
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