But What Do They Know About YOU?

“You really need to get to know your people. What makes them tick? What are their dreams, goals, and fears? What’s their family life like? Where do they want to be in five years? What challenges are they dealing with? How well do you really KNOW your people?”

If I heard something like that once I heard it a thousand times, and for good reason.

At some point in your leadership journey, you’ve either read something like that or heard it preached from the leadership pulpit. Leadership is never about you, the leader – it’s always about those you lead and the team they comprise, for they are the ones who will be implementing the vision and accomplishing the impossible.

If you really want to be able to identify with and build rapport with your team or inspire them to break through boundaries and achieve the impossible, it is critical that you get to know them. Each of them. Individually. No two are the same and each responds differently to your leadership style. This is such great advice and one of the cornerstones of effective leadership.

But – ponder this: How much do your people know about YOU?

If your leadership is transactional, then it’s probably not a big deal. But if your style of leadership promotes something more, isn’t it as important if we’re talking about building deep, meaningful bonds with those we serve?

Are great relationships built in only one direction or do they grow and thrive on back and forth sharing?

I recognize this is a subject which will find a large amount of people on either side of the discussion.

I think that some of it depends on how people perceive and define the boundary that exists between leaders and those they lead.

There are many who will argue that there is no need for followers to know their leaders on a personal level. They may view it as a line that shouldn’t be crossed because once it is, there is no going back. Slogans like “familiarity breeds contempt” come to mind. Those in this camp might also say that personal bonds can cloud the judgment of those called to make tough decisions which impact the lives of those they lead – sometimes in a dramatic way. I can understand this, having worked in an environment where lives were at stake and the decision-making burden was heavy indeed.

Others may not see the boundary between leaders and followers in the same way. They might assess that the leader and followers’ ability to recognize and respect any leader/follower dynamic allows both parties more freedom. The maturity of those involved, their understanding of roles and responsibilities, and their emotional intelligence all play a part in this model.

Early in my professional career I was taught that those I led didn’t need to know about me on a personal level. In effect, knowing anything personal about me was irrelevant and once that boundary was crossed, it would be impossible to go back. I had several influential people in my work life share that with me and the interactions I observed and even had with my own bosses implicitly validated what I had heard.

I was cautioned to be mindful about what I revealed, in part to prevent personal bonds from interfering with the very weighty decisions I might be called upon to make. My job was to be out in front doing what I expected my team to do and showing the way. I couldn’t let my guard down. Rain or shine, they needed to see the way to go, and have someone they could focus on despite the chaos around them. My job was to be the rock. Suffice it to say, rocks are unfeeling and unemotional. You can’t have a meaningful conversation with a rock, nor can they provide you with a connection when you need it most. They’re just…. rocks.

Looking back many years later, I understand why I needed to perform in that manner at that moment in time. The mission was that critical and that model of leadership had proven successful time and again. It works and that is what is required for that environment. However, it does not apply in every situation and maybe it’s more the exception than the rule.

As I transitioned to the second stage of my professional career it was obvious that while there were many things about that style that set me up for success, there were certain things that no longer applied. I was in a unique environment with a new group of people with a vastly different purpose.

Leaning on what I had learned in the past and being open to expanding my leadership optic, I learned a lot and refined my style to be more effective. Some of it was intentional and some was simply a function of being someplace new with its own history, traditions, and culture which had a shaping effect on me. I felt like I had adapted well because I had listened to the wise counsel of a few friends and colleagues who had gone ahead of me on a similar journey.

But as we all know, certain habits and styles stay with us, and we become ignorant of their presence until our actions or behaviors are challenged. Such was the case with me.

On a particular nondescript, regular workday someone from my team walked into my office for what I assumed was one of our typical work conversations. The progression usually involved some rapport building, catching up on the latest news, and then either an update or brain-storming session.

Instead, I was met with “We need to talk…we’ve worked together for years…no one knows you…who you are…what makes you happy or angry….you’re always the same…you never get excited and you never get down…do you even have a pulse?....you are flatlined…no emotion…dependable but no one knows YOU…people are saying you’re aloof.”

I didn’t know what to say and just sat there, dumbfounded. Aloof? Here I had been thinking all along that being flatlined, neither excited nor down, was exactly what my team needed. My reasoning had been just, at least in my own mind. I never wanted to “burden” them with my emotions or my story and wanted them to always see a rock that they could depend on.

What I failed to consider was that they had a boss they couldn’t identify with as a human being because I wasn’t always acting like one – at least not one who would fit in with the team. That hit me hardest and it’s only been recently that I’ve been able to better understand what was happening. Yes, I was leading the team, but I was also supposed to be a PART of the team! I may have had a different role and different responsibilities, for sure, but so did everyone else.

It became obvious that while I had, in good faith, sought to support and encourage my team every way I knew how, I had been robbing them of the opportunity to get to know me. Was that important? Yes! I had always sought something deeper than transactional leadership but withholding myself wasn’t the answer.

After all, we worked together every day on important projects and needed to trust one another implicitly. It was all about the team, yet to some it looked like I was on the outside looking in, and in many ways, they were probably right.

I will admit this really got my attention. I had been operating the same way for several years and would have never guessed this would be what someone would challenge. I was so taken aback I had to look up “aloof” in the dictionary. Disinterested? Indifferent? Not a chance! Everything I did was for this team and at work, NOTHING was more important to me than them, individually and collectively. I couldn’t figure out how I could be projecting anything other than that.

It would be a few more years before I would embark on the journey of really getting to know myself and unearthing some major discoveries, one of which was my strongly introverted personality. What that meant and how it may have impacted me is a discussion for another day. Suffice it to say, I didn’t know and maybe it explains, in part, what my team was seeing in me and how I communicated and interacted with them.

But at that time, what I knew and felt was not being projected nor received. This bothered me enough that I made some changes.

Instead of just walking around every day to check in with people and then moving on, I stopped and joined in the team discussions to share a little bit about me when asked. It wasn’t easy and it certainly wasn’t comfortable when I first started. There is no doubt there were some who thought something was “off” with the boss. I did come to enjoy sharing what I was thinking and so I persisted. Doing my part to advance individual and collective relationships was freeing and fulfilling!

I feel like my relationships with my teammates matured rapidly. As my team got to know me better, they were able to anticipate my decisions and reactions, act decisively in my absence, and give me the opportunity to contribute more to the team. In turn, I was freed of some of the self-imposed pressures I had been burdened with and came away with a much more profound appreciation for my role and how to do my job better. Most importantly, I felt like I was a PART of the team and not just an observer.

Does this sound like something you can identify with? If so, take some time to think about it. How well DOES your team know you? What can you do to change that? Do you even need to change that? Are things “good enough” or do you want more? What will or won’t happen if you DO make changes? What will or won’t happen if you DON’T make changes?

Truth be told, I wish I knew then what I know now about letting my team get to know me better. I wonder if things would have been different. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that this thing called leadership is a journey and you never quite get “there” – wherever “there” is. A new challenge or growth opportunity is right around the next corner and could happen the next time someone walks in your office and says, “we need to talk.”