Side by Side Leadership : Achieving Outstanding Results Together

"The problem is, we're only increasing our performance by 4 or 5 percent a year!" You pick up a marker and draw a nearly horizontal line on the whiteboard:

"That's not good enough. Our competitors' productivity is way up here." You draw another line above the first:

"We're getting left behind! We've got to grow, we've got to get a lot more productive. We need big step improvements." You draw a stepped line on the board between your current performance and your desired improvement:

"This is what we need," you say, jabbing at the third line. "We have to improve by 20 or 30 percent a year to overtake them."

You've called me in to consult because you've heard about Performance Resources, Inc., and the performance improvements it has helped other companies achieve. I've had much the same conversation with executives, managers, supervisors, and team leaders in a wide range of organizations: high-techs, like Advanced Micro Devices, Dell Computer, Motorola, and Texas Instruments; manufacturers such as Asea Brown Boveri, Dow Corning, Monsanto, and Westinghouse; natural resource companies including Amoco, Arco, and Vastar Resources; even local, state, and federal governments.

"I've been told that other organizations have realized productivity and performance gains of anywhere from 30 to 300 percent," you say. "Tell me what we have to do to get that kind of improvement."

"First, I'd like you to tell me something," I reply. "How good a job are your leaders doing? Are they effective? Do your employees work well with them?"

"I hear a lot of employee complaints about some of our managers," you reply. "Nobody likes working for them. We move the managers to new positions, and the people there start complaining. Either they transfer into another division, or they stay where they are and not much work gets done." "How many of your supervisors and managers are running into this kind of trouble?"

"I'd say at least half of them don't know quite how to treat their subordinates, or even their peers. You know, it's funny, but these are good people. It's just that when you put them in positions of responsibility, in charge of others, their worst impulses come out. They become demanding, autocratic. Some of them turn into tyrants."

"So you'd say that the common denominator is that these good people that you put in charge of teams and operations feel compelled to exercise more authority? They try to be the'boss'?"

"Yes, that's right. Even though that's not our intention, that seems to be what happens. We promote them, we set goals for their new teams, and we let them handle things as they see fit. They start giving orders, and first thing you know everybody's complaining and resisting. The result is that they rarely meet their goals or deadlines."

A Familiar Pattern

"Okay," I say. "What you're describing is the 'top down' leadership style. The ideas and the orders come from the top. They're handed down to subordinates without discussion, and subordinates are expected to follow them without objection. Does that sound familiar?"

"Yes. Exactly."

"Unfortunately," I say, "top-down does business anymore. The work force is better educated, and the business environment is changing faster. To survive, you have to use your employees' knowledge and skills more effectively, and you have to give them the ability to respond to the changes. Top-down managers just can't react fast enough.

"And top-down leadership is all too common. About half of all managers, supervisors, and executives fail to lead effectively because they make this basic mistake. I can show you plenty of hard research that supports this conclusion - research based on ratings by these leaders' subordinates, peers, and supervisors, and on objective assessments such as goal achievement.

"Fifty percent failure! Just think of the productivity your organization could achieve if your leadership became 70, 80, or 90 percent effective!"

You agree. "I know we'd be in a lot better competitive shape now with better leadership."

"Now let's see what's going on in your company," I say. "Tell me what top-down leadership behaviors you see in the following leadership functions. Start with communication." As you describe your organization's traits, I take notes summarizing your comments.

"What about employees' behavior?" I ask.

"The biggest problems are low performance and low productivity. People simply refuse to work well for the top-down bosses - especially the self-motivated, hard-working, smart people. The best workers leave."

Old Definitions of Leadership

"Let's talk about what we mean by leadership," I say. "How would you define leadership?"

You think for a minute. "I guess I think of it as the ability to get people to follow you and carry out your wishes. But I think I'll go with what my dictionary says." You find your Webster's on a nearby shelf. "Let's see - here it is: 'the ability to direct, command, or guide a group or activity.'"2

"Sounds pretty top-down, doesn't it?" I say. "Particularly the words 'direct' and 'command.' But that's typical. Let me read you some definitions I've found in other books. Here's one from The Essence of Leadership, by Edwin Locke: 'the process of inducing others to take action toward a common goal.'3 And here's a definition in Bernard Bass's Handbook of Leadership: 'the process of influencing the activities of an organized group in its efforts toward goal setting and goal achievement.'4 And there are five other passages in Bass's book that define the leader along the lines of 'one who influences followers.'

"As you can see, most authorities think of leadership in top-down terms - something that is done to someone else." I go to the whiteboard, pick up a marking pen, and start drawing. "The concept is that the influencing is all one way, from the top to the bottom. It's no wonder newly promoted supervisors and leaders think they're supposed to lead this way. That's what they learned from watching their bosses."

"I have to confess," you say, "I never liked bosses who treated me top-down, so I can understand why employees would resent it. But I couldn't find any good alternatives. "I actually tried a different leadership approach I'd been hearing about. For our annual planning and budgeting process, I asked supervisors and managers to submit plans and budgets for anything they wanted to do. It gave me a pretty good jolt. The new spending they wanted was so high it would have driven us into bankruptcy.

"I can't just strip my managers of their authority and let employees do their own thing, or even do the leading, can I?"

"No," I reply, "you can't. What you're talking about is called 'bottom-up' leadership. Like this." I erase my arrow and redraw it pointing upward. "Some supervisors have gone to that extreme of participative management. Executives who spent their entire careers practicing autocratic leadership read Robert Greenleaf's Servant Leadership and did a complete turnaround.5 But they misunderstood Greenleaf and others like him. They went too far. The proponents of participative management never meant to advocate a one-way, bottom-up model.

"Others have tried different approaches that fall somewhere between the extremes of top-down and bottom-up leadership. But like you, these other managers and supervisors have yet to find a way to lead that consistently increases productivity. There's still that muddle in the middle."

"Well, neither top-down nor bottom-up has worked very well for us," you say. "I sometimes wonder if the term 'leadership' can even be used here."

"I used to find leadership just as confusing and confounding," I say. "The word had secrets I couldn't fathom, powers I couldn't unlock. I knew some leaders were great leaders, but I couldn't tell exactly why. It seemed like some kind of magic. I had no idea how to change my own leadership practices to get better results.

"But I decided I would discover those secrets, whatever it took. I set that as my goal. I began to dig and read. I searched through 3,000 leadership studies and books for an alternative to top-down or bottom-up leadership.

"And I found what I was looking for." I draw another figure on the board. "It sounds simple, but here's what I discovered: when leaders listen to contributors - and this is true both in teams and in the organization as a whole - when they share the leadership, productivity takes off.

"The kind of leadership I'm talking about is two-way, mutual, and interactive. This diagram shows a basic principle: the top arrow shows that the contributor talks first while the leader listens. The lower arrow is the leader presenting his or her ideas while the contributor listens. It's always a two-way interaction.

"This is basically what I'm going to show you over the next several days. I call it 'Side by Side Leadership.' That's a term I settled on to distinguish it from both top-down and bottom-up leadership.

"You may have noticed I just used the word 'contributor' where you might have expected to hear 'follower.' I have a good reason for this. A follower can be anyone who passively follows orders. A follower does not have to think. A follower does not have to contribute ideas or share responsibility for success or failure.

"In Side by Side Leadership, I use the term 'contributor' to reflect the fact that many others besides the leader contribute to the achievement of objectives and the success of the organization. Contributors accept and complete work assignments, but they also work with others, furnish knowledge, skills, and ideas, and share the responsibility
for success or failure. Leaders need contributors, not just followers, to get results.

"And in all that research I mentioned, the conclusions are clear: When leadership is shared and mutual, workers are more innovative. They get the work done faster and at less cost."

Side by Side in Brief

"I've come prepared for this meeting with you," I continue, "because I'm excited about what I've learned from the documented research I've found, along with my years of experience in the field." I briefly describe for you what I've learned in the course of my research:

• In companies where workers and leaders abandon old-style, top-down behavior and begin to share leadership, performance (productivity or profitability) improves by 15 percent within six months.

• When leaders lead their teams and work groups using Side by Side Leadership, quality, cost control, customer satisfaction, productivity, and profits rise by 20 to 40 percent within one year.

• Knowledge leaders - engineers, scientists, marketers, technicians, and other professionals - who develop and share their knowledge side by side are more productive than those who do not.6

• Organizations where most of the leaders use Side by Side Leadership techniques double or triple their organizational results within four years.

"My colleagues and I have also found that most leaders want their entire organization to improve together, not just particular teams or departments. For this to happen, Side by Side Leadership principles must be implemented in each of five spheres of influence - personal, interpersonal, team, organizational, and knowledge leadership." I reach into my briefcase and produce a sheet of paper with an unfamiliar graphic on it.

You ask me, "You mean I have to be a good leader in all five of these areas of leadership?"

"Fortunately for you, me, and everybody else in the world," I reply, "the answer is no. You don't have to be strong in all spheres at the same time. Very few people could ever hope to be. Most of us can be strong in one or two spheres at a time, but we are naturally weaker in others. But for the organization as a whole to improve and grow, it needs leadership in all five spheres."

Customized Leadership

"Let me give you an example. Here's the leadership profile of Hank, a first-line supervisor. Hank was a team leader we assessed for one of our clients. He was one of the highest-rated leaders in his organization. Notice that Hank's team leadership sphere is larger than his knowledge leadership sphere. Although his technical knowledge of the manufacturing equipment and methods was not high, Hank was a master of team facilitating, When he used the principles of Side by Side Leadership, his team's productivity went up 30 percent.

"This is only one of many potentially successful leadership patterns. No matter what your own interests and abilities, you can be a successful leader."

"That's interesting," you say. "How can I figure out my own profile?"

"There is a self-assessment you can use after you learn more about the five spheres of Side by Side Leadership influence," I reply.

"Well, when can I begin learning the basics?"

"I'll start you off right now," I say. "There are seven principles that make up the foundation for everything you need to know. They're based on that research I told you about. Each principle is a part of the whole, a piece of the puzzle. Here's how each principle improves performance."

I begin describing the seven principles. As we discuss them, I jot down on the whiteboard a summary of the benefits of each principle.

"A leader who uses all seven of these principles, all seven pieces of the puzzle, in each sphere of leadership influence is more likely to achieve success." I draw a sphere on the whiteboard and divide it into seven puzzle pieces.

"Each of the five spheres of influence can be thought of the same way - as an assemblage of seven parts. A leader can apply each of the seven principles when leading in any of the five spheres. For example, developing shared visionary goals (Principle 3) in the team leadership sphere increases the likelihood of having a high performance team with outstanding results.

"Another way to implement Side by Side Leadership is to learn and use a set of twenty skills." I hand you another printed page. "This shows how these twenty skills are related to the five spheres of leadership influence. But this doesn't mean each skill is limited to a particular sphere. Even though interpersonal listening, for example, is related to the Interpersonal Leadership sphere, a leader can also use that skill to succeed in the other spheres as well - personal, knowledge, team, and organizational leadership."

You look at my handouts, then at my scribblings on the whiteboard. You shake your head. "Pretty complicated. Seems a bit overwhelming."

"That's the bad news about Side by Side Leadership," I say. "It is a system model, and like all system models, it has
many interrelated parts. It is complex, because leadership is not a simple thing. Never has been.

"But here's the good news: this system gives you many entry points. It gives you many ways to get started improving
your own leadership, and the leadership of others, to increase productivity."

You look doubtful. "I'm still not sure," you say.

"You sound like a colleague of mine, name of Ted. Let me tell you about him.

"Ted is a brilliant, creative executive, a very accomplished idea man, but not too long ago he found himself about to lose his job. He could come up with the most creative ideas for new business and marketing strategies, but nobody who worked for him would implement his ideas.

"We sat down with him and analyzed his leadership habits. Here's what we discovered.

"He often came into scheduled meetings, changed the agenda on the spot, and proceeded to talk about items of his own choosing. Unfortunately, the others in the meeting, unprepared for the topic, would often misunderstand or fail to follow his intentions.

"When he delegated work, he would later change what the person assigned to it had done. That person would quickly lose all enthusiasm for future tasks, and Ted would find it harder and harder to work with him.

"For efficiency, he limited his leadership interactions to just a few minutes of 'top-down' orders and instructions. But little got done, and the resistance and conflict that resulted would last for months, Whatever time Ted thought he was saving was quickly lost.

"We counseled Ted to give Side by Side Leadership a try. We guided him through the basics, through the five leadership spheres of influence, the seven principles, the twenty key skills. We showed him how to put them together, how to use them to set goals, solve problems, and accomplish objectives.

"Ted learned the value of a mutual sharing of information, knowledge, and experience when making a decision. He learned to slow down and listen, rather than simply issuing orders and turning to other matters. He learned to see his people as people, with ideas and skills and feelings and opinions, rather than as pieces to be moved around on a chessboard.

"Once he had grown accustomed to the principles and practices of two-way behaviors, Ted observed that applying Side by Side Leadership was like sailing with the wind at his back. He found that more work got done, with less emotional drag. He got along better with his contributors and co-workers. He found the experience exhilarating.

"Now I want to encourage you to try the principles, practices, and skills of Side by Side Leadership yourself. Watch how others respond. Measure the results you get in the first few months.

"And that," I say to you, "is basically what this book I'm giving you is all about. In the first few chapters you will find some practical tips that you can try out immediately to start improving your own performance and that of others.

"Using the principles of Side by Side Leadership presented in this book will transform your leadership abilities. It will raise your organization to new heights of efficiency, productivity, and profitability. Read it. Learn from it. Enjoy it. It will open your eyes."

The book is now in your hands.

--From Side by Side Leadership : Achieving Outstanding Results Together, by Dennis A. Romig. ©October 2001, Bard Press used by permission.


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