#92: You Can Lead From Anywhere
You don't need a formal title to lead
Hello, and welcome to this week’s Edition of the Work in Progress Newsletter. If you’re new here, drop me a line and tell me who you are and what you are excited about that you’re working on right now!
Here is what’s on tap for this week’s newsletter
Lead From Anywhere
What I’m Watching
What’s New With Me
🗺 How to Lead From Anywhere 🗺
This week, I had the chance to attend LinkedIn’s Talent Connect Conference to speak on the Creator Conversations Show with Scott Rising and Minda Harts. For those who aren’t familiar, Creator Conversations is a monthly series from LinkedIn which showcases Creators on the platform talking about topics of importance to the workplace. The session's topic was around Learning to Lead, and how employees can learn and demonstrate leadership skills to be effective and stand out in the workplace.
You can watch the recording here, but we talked about everything from if leadership could be taught or learned, how leadership is defined today, why leadership is more than just a formal title, and the ways in which you can know and develop your leadership skills. It was a great conversation, and certainly inspiring to me about the work I get to do each day Not to mention, this was my first real live-TV experience, which ended up being a lot of fun and something I can see myself doing more in the future. (Big shoutout to Trish for making it happen!)
Right before going Live at LinkedIn Talent Connect in Downtown LA!
One of the things I got to share and talk about in the show was my belief that employees can lead from anywhere. Demonstrating leadership skills is not something you have to wait to have a formal leadership position to do, but rather, you can lead right from where you are. And, in fact, any executive or formal leader with real position or authority, would be better off if they championed, supported, and encouraged more individuals to actively practice and exhibit their leadership skills each day, regardless of where that individual sat within the organization.
Here is why I believe that:
I’ve been fortunate enough to personally have some success and wins at scale in the workplace working in 50,000+ organizations where I had no formal power or authority, and wasn’t very high on the org chart
I see this happen often, especially in the organizations I work with, where countless everyday employees are driving collective success that leads to outcomes even when they don’t have formal control, but because so much work today is collaborative and cross-functional, and requires working together to achieve a common goal
Great ideas can come from anywhere. Innovation is no longer “top down,” and everyday employees are often closest to the action of what customers and clients really need
I’ve also seen this happen outside of traditional workplaces, where there really is no formal authority or control, such as in schools, non-profits, online communities, etc
We all exist in a world and construct outside of just ourselves. However, not everyone thinks in that way, so people that do and can connect the dots, often can be seen as a leader
Thank you to Trish, my Creator Manager for the opportunity!
So what does that look like? Here are just a few examples of people who I’ve encountered who have demonstrated the ability to lead from anywhere:
People like Diego Granados, who after using his MBA to transition into a career in product management, starts to post YouTube videos about tips for others to break into product management, eventually gets thousands of subscribers, builds a PM Community to help thousands of other people break into product management, and through his work, makes a career transition into a PM role helping employees who want to transition careers.
People like Megan Loyst, who after seeing how challenging it was to break into Venture Capital, decides to start a community for Gen Z students who want to learn about the venture capital industry and land internships and jobs in this space, and then scales the community to over 20,000 members.
And people like Willie Sullivan, who after reflecting on his own thoughts and concerns after the murder of George Floyd, decides to start The John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition which garners support from his classmates and school, and ends up getting over 1000+ students across the world to participate.
So how can an employee who wants to embrace their leadership skills and lead from where they are do that starting today? Here are a few ideas:
1)Start From Where You Are - It’s easy to mark leadership as a title or as the thing you formally work toward before you can start demonstrating it, but the best place to start with leadership is right where you are, regardless if you’re a new intern up to the CEO, or if you’re working remotely or in the office.
All of us work in systems and organizations that are much larger than ourselves, and in today’s collaborative work environment it's really hard to work on something entirely on your own. Acknowledging this idea that leadership is a verb and a set of actions that you can take today and choosing to exercise that agency is a mindset shift. Now, as you start to to think about the cross-functional projects you are managing, or the times when you need to get the support and buy in from your peers to get resources or get something done, you can think about the lease
2)Give Yourself Credit - I think we all need to give ourselves a bit more credit for the work that we do each and every day. It's really easy to just get in autopilot mode to knock off things on the priority list and not really think about what we are doing or the impact we’re making. Taking the time to actually understand how the work you are doing and the skills+attributes you are using are driving outcomes and making impact helps you figure out what you can double down on, or perhaps use in other areas to drive even greater impact for your initiatives and projects.
3)Be the Connective Tissue - Leadership is really about being the connective tissue and spotting where the cracks, inflection and connection points and disparate ideas are, tying them together, and then conveying that to others. When working with others, try seeing and finding the broken points or connection points and being the connector/integrator. We all have our own agenda items even when we are collaborating and it’s easy to miss those integration points, so find where those are and connect the dots.
4)Find Your Greater Good - Leadership is about scale, and getting to a sizable outcome that you or others couldn’t achieve working on your own. From a tactical level there are things that you can do to get there, but from a strategic level that means having a desire and ambition that is for something that is far greater than just a singular goal/outcome. Simon Sinek would call this your “why” but I think it’s more than that. It’s a mindset and a fundamental belief/desire to work towards something impactful or meaningful however you define that. For Diego, the greater good was watching other career switchers break into product management, or for Willie, it was about educating and making MBA students aware of the importance of racial justice in the business world.
If you agree (or disagree) that you can lead from anywhere, I’d love to hear what you think, or how you’ve done it!
👀2.What I’m Watching 👀
Article: Is Long-Term Employee Retention a Losing Battle (Worklife News) - Employee retention is undoubtedly important especially in these times, but I agree with the premise of this article which is if you’re just focusing on retention you’re missing the bigger strategic point.
Article: Can Demand For Executive MBAs Ride Out Recession? (FT) - The title of the article is a little bit of a stretch but it highlights some of the current state of the Executive MBA market, typically a very lucrative & profitable offering for MBA programs. During COVID, applications have increased, but also, the same person these program targets has their own set of challenges + opportunities, ranging from having leverage for being an in-demand skilled worker, to concerns around the high cost of the program and increased cost of living.
Podcast: CoRise on EdTech Insiders - CoRise is a early stage startup founded by a handful of ex-Coursera employees+founders trying to reimagine + reinvent upskilling and learning and development. There’s a lot of folks right now trying to remagine this space, but it’s clear that CoRise has some expertise & firepower given their background
🔎My Latest 🔎
Between the Linkedin Creator Accelerator Program #BetterWaysofWorking Series, two podcasts and other appearances I’ve had a lot of content lately. Here are some of my latest posts and ideas:
Frameworks For Career Growth & Mobility - People have different views on what career growth means which also means we need to provide more language and expansive ways to guide them in their career growth. Here are a handful of ideas that I think are a great starting point
New Ways to Explore Careers in The Future of Work - Here are a handful of ideas and innovators who are increasing the opportunities and resources for students & professionals to explore and experiment with careers
Poll Results: Most Helpful Resources For Career Development - I asked my followers what were the most helpful resources to grow your career. Hint: they involved people!
Recorded Video: Learning To Lead - Here is a replay and recording of my LinkedIn Live event on learning to lead with Scott Rising and Minda Harts
Fractional Talent Marketplaces with Nolan Church and Continuum - Nolan and his team are building an interesting talent marketplace to connect executives to part-time fractional opportunities at Fast-Growing startups. Check out my conversation with him on how they are matching high quality talent with fractional opportunities.
Before You Go: Check Out The Career Clarity Kickstarter
My Good friend Jenni Fink, the Owner and Founder of Fink Development created a 6 week course for professionals who want get clear on their career goals to make their next move. If you have a feeling you want to make a career move but aren’t sure how to get started or what to do next I would encourage you to check out Jenni’s course. Jenni was my career coach when Iw as an MBA student, and cannot recommend her enough. Check out here course here, and follow her on LinkedIn to get a feel for what she is like.
Have a Great Week!
Al