Leading people is hard: fight your inner manager
Leading a team is hard, mostly because managing seems to be part of our nature. To know and control everything that goes on around you always seems to be the best way to minimize your risk of failure or of being seen to make a public mistake.
You will find yourself fighting the manager within you on a daily basis, at least early in your career. I make it a point to think about the decisions I have made and critically evaluate them. Did I micromanage? Did I specify a solution when I should have just communicated the problem and let the team find its own solution? Did I assign a decision to someone and then not follow the direction he or she picked?
When my review turns up an un-leaderly action, I undo it. If I can’t undo it, I find the person that I failed and apologize. Every time. You won’t always do the right thing the first time. Make the lesson stick—heart-learn it—by fixing your mistake quickly and as publicly as is appropriate.
Also, I rely on my mentors here. When I am unsure of my own motives, I always find a sounding board in one of them before I act. I may still follow my original intention, but this step gives me the chance to refine my plan and at least be aware of any short-comings before I get started. Sometimes my judgment is clouded by my own emotional response to a perceived slight or threat (leading is a human activity, after all, and we human beings are filled to overflowing with silly emotions).
At these times, my mentors never hesitate to lead me to see this for myself, usually before I’ve acted. Very occasionally my boss, who is a leader, will see something in my actions that I have not seen. At these times he’ll pull me into his office, close the door, and constructively correct me. We are friends, and this isn’t easy for him. He does it to make me a better leader by helping me look into my blind spots. He and I also know that this sets the example for me to do the right thing even when it is not personally pleasant.
Keep this in mind when you are interacting with your friends and coworkers and do the right thing: you never know who is learning from your example.
