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Transcript

How To Lead When You Are NOT The Expert & Deliver Impressive Results · Enhance.training

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: We are promoted into management positions because we are the expert.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Then we get promoted again or manage projects where we are definitely not the expert.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: How to lead when you're not the expert and deliver impressive results needs another set of skills, a different mindset and a new approach.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: The good news is you and any manager will be able to learn exactly what is needed for success fairly quickly.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: You'll no longer feel out of place, unsure of what you can add, an imposter or a fraud.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: You will stand out with confidence in any room full of experts through what you help others do and achieve rather than what you know yourself.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: For how to lead when you're not the expert, we are going through firstly how to confidently find experts to trust.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: Secondly, your most important responsibility.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: Third, what to focus on to earn trust and be credible, and fourth, nine essential actions for leading people who know more than you.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: In the Essential Actions section, I break down the tactics, activities, and actions that you should be focused on every single day so that you can lead your team of experts to deliver really impressive results and enjoy the journey too.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: Right, let's get started.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: The first action when leading when you're not the expert is to confidently find experts to trust.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: When you're not the expert, working out who you can trust in your team to tell you exactly what is what is not always straightforward.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: Avoiding the experts who put themselves before the team or who might undermine you is just as important.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: I've come across plenty of experts who talk a very, very good game, yet when it comes to the crunch, really struggle to deliver even half of their promises.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: After getting burned a few times, you quickly develop approaches to weed these people out.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: Four approaches to help navigate these challenges with confidence are firstly make the time and ask for help to work out what your own blind spots are.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: For example, I've successfully delivered a lot of company-wide system implementation projects.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: I am not an IT expert.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: So when there are technical issues, you know, say with system integrations, I get help quickly.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: Knowing your blind spot gives you the opportunity to organise ahead of time the people you need to cover your own blind spots.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: Secondly, when you are not the expert, lead with questions.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Or I have spotted two problems we need to mitigate.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: Changes to, I am not the expert here.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: I've spotted two problems.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: What problems do you see that I have missed?
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: Be humble.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: Ask questions to draw out your team members' expertise.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: Make them feel good about educating you.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: I often play a little bit dumb and ask questions and see who gives me the full picture and who just tells me the good parts of it if you like.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: Lead with questions.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Thirdly, when you're not the expert, use a show me, not tell me approach.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: This is a tactic I generally use a lot, and especially when I'm not sure if I'm being told the unvarnished truth.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: In the process you also learn very quickly who tells you honestly what is happening and who filters unhelpfully.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: An example.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: A sales team member says they are on track to happily beat targets this month.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: I ask what gives them so much confidence.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: They explain the different aspects of their pipeline and the prospects that they are chatting to.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Then I say, I'm really interested to see how you're getting such great results so early in the month.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: Please can we go through the activity on the CRM system for your top six prospects?
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: The person starts to look a little bit nervous and you know for definite that you want to see the details.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: Use a show me rather than tell me approach.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: Fourth, use other experts that you already trust to figure out which experts you are worth trusting and who not to.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: It can be pretty easy to ask another expert to join a call or join a meeting, and their input can save you hours of problems later.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: In short, make the time to find experts that you can trust.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Jess Coles.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: If you're new here, Enhance.training provides resources and courses for you to build management expertise and confidence to lead any team to their best performance.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: Don't forget to take a look in the podcast description for more resources to help you improve your leadership expertise so that you can move your career forward faster and have a happier, more productive team.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: Secondly, your most important responsibility for leading when you are not the expert is to clearly define the right problem that needs to be solved.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Finding the right problem to solve is not as easy as many think.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: Keep asking why questions, and you'll absolutely be able to find the right problem.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: Most of the obvious problems are symptom problems and are caused by not so very obvious underlying problems.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: Solve symptom problems and the problems will keep coming back, wasting time and resources and leaving you feeling very frustrated.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: Solve the underlying problem and all the symptom problems disappear too.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: When you are not the expert, finding the underlying problem is that bit harder.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: When your team finds a problem, keep asking why is this problem happening?
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: For example, the team is on track to miss its sales targets for this month.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: Why are we missing our sales targets, you might ask?
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: We don't have enough leads is the answer.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: Why don't we have enough leads?
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: The marketing adverts are not generating the usual number of leads.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, well why are the adverts not converting as well as they normally do?
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: The answer might be our best advertising manager left last month and has yet to be replaced.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: So in this simple example, the underlying problem is really recruitment, not sales.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: Keep asking why until you find the underlying problem.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: When you have the underlying problem, be really clear in how you define the problem.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: The clearer the definition, the easier it will be to get the experts to create an effective solution for that problem, and the easier you'll find it measuring progress for the creating and implementing of that solution.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: Make your problem definition specific, measurable, actionable, realistic, and with a time frame to solve.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: The third action when leading when you are not the expert is to focus on results to earn trust and be credible.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: You are not the expert, so planning out the tasks and activities to do to get the result you want should not be your job.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: Organising the experts and keeping them working to a defined problem in a coordinated and collaborative fashion is your responsibility.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: The best way I found to be hands-on in the management areas and hands-off in the areas that are not my expertise is to focus on results.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: Agree with your team what the milestones and final goals are in terms of measurable results.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: Measure progress against those milestones and goals.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: When milestones are being achieved, stay hands-off and give your experts space and autonomy.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: When milestones are in danger of being missed, then you can jump in and work out why and what to do about it with the experts.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: Be hands-on in organizing, communicating, coordinating, etc., i.e.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: the management aspects.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: Focus on results.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: You'll get a lot more appreciation, trust and credibility as a non-expert when you focus on playing to each team member's strengths and staying out of the way when it is not your strength.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: Lastly, here are 9 essential actions for leading people who know more than you.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Focus your efforts on helping your experts spend as much time on solving the problem and implementing the solution as possible.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: Maximising the use of their expertise in as short a space of time as possible is very valuable to everyone, and you'll keep your experts a lot happier.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: The essential actions I think a leader of experts should focus on are firstly getting the right experts into the team to solve the problems that you face.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: Secondly, know the strengths of your team and test the expertise of members so that you know how best to use each person and who will serve the team the best.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: Build relationships with each person to achieve this.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: Third, keep the goals clear and at the front of everyone's mind.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: Repeat, repeat, repeat until they are sick of hearing about it.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: Fourth, spend more time listening and asking questions than speaking.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: Fifth, organising and coordinating the activities of the team is your key job.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Sixth, keeping communication between team members high, including facilitating group problem solving and encourage lots of collaboration.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: Seventh, work to remove any non-technical problems as quickly as possible.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_00: Access to resources at the right time, or keeping distractions away from the team, or team members being pulled away, etc.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: Eighth, empower team members.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: Encourage and praise a lot.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: Give team members space and trust.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: Give them frameworks to work within rather than tasks and activities to do.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: Elevate them rather than constrict them, especially when they work for the good of the team.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: And ninth, communicate achievements on an individual level and a team level to stakeholders and colleagues outside of the team.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: Give credit where it's due.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: There is an awful lot you can do to help and support a team of experts be at their best when you are not the expert.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: You have the skills to do a great job and earn their respect and appreciation.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Do what they are not the experts on.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: Great teams perform so well because of the differences within the team, not the similarities.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: So, in summary, how to lead when you are not the expert is a different mindset, a different approach using the skills that you already have as a manager.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Use the tactics and approaches that we have discussed, and you will do great and be instrumental part of the team that delivers impressive results.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: Play to your strengths as a leader and let your experts play to their strengths.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone will be a lot happier and the group will deliver much more impressive results.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: As a reminder for how to lead when you are not the expert, we have covered.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: Firstly, how to confidently find experts to trust.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Secondly, your most important responsibility, which is to clearly define the problem that you want solved.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: Third, what to focus on to earn trust and be credible.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: And fourth, nine essential actions for leading people who know more than you.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: Take these actions and you can lead any group of experts, even when you know very little.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Don't forget to take a look in the podcast description for more resources to help you improve your leadership expertise so that you can move your career forward faster and have a happier, more productive team.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: If you have any questions on how to lead when you're not in the expert and deliver impressive results, please email me at support at enhance.training and I'll get back to you.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks very much for listening, and I look forward to speaking to you again soon.