You're a leader in a demanding role that you expect to occupy for the foreseeable future. Your work is personally meaningful and materially rewarding. And yet you occasionally think about leaving, not because you want a "better job," but because you're tired of lugging the baggage that comes with your current one: The difficult employee, colleague or investor who you'd like to get rid of but can't. The onerous work that only you can do--fundraising, or public speaking, or managing a conflict on your team. The depleting experience of always being under a spotlight. If this sounds familiar, you're similar to some of my clients.
These clients aren't actively planning to leave their current roles, and their sporadic interest in alternative paths isn't the issue that led them to seek coaching. Although I sometimes work with clients as they navigate a professional transition, that's usually the result of unexpected circumstances, such as the sale of their company or family obligations. But should these clients choose to follow these impulses they could readily find another role--and you could, too.
And yet before you begin actively pursuing a possible change, it's worth asking yourself: What baggage would I leave behind? And what baggage would I take with me? You won't leave it all behind if you move on--some of it will come with you because it was yours to begin with, not a function of the job. These questions should be asked in three related but distinct domains:
1. Interpersonal
Every leadership role comes with interpersonal baggage--it's one of the topics that comes up most frequently in my practice, along with self-care and organizational culture. Leader-follower relationships are inherently fraught, particularly in growing organizations where managers must constantly assess whether their reports are keeping pace with the demands of their roles. Peer relationships among leaders within an organization inevitably involve some competitive rivalry. And relationships with investors or board members often require a leader to interact with people who are complex, charismatic and difficult.
You undoubtedly have your own version of this baggage, and it's probably one the main reasons why you consider leaving--but you won't leave it all behind simply by replacing your current colleagues with new ones. To understand what baggage would come with you if you left, ask yourself...
- How have I contributed to the difficulties in these relationships?
- What feedback have I gotten from my colleagues? How have I responded?
- What have I learned about how to hold tough conversations and resolve conflicts?
- Looking back on my career, are there patterns of interpersonal difficulties in which I'm the common denominator?
You may conclude that the bulk of the baggage belongs to other people, and it may be time to move on as a result. But before you reach that conclusion, be sure you've learned as much as possible about your interpersonal baggage and be prepared to work on it with future colleagues.
2. Contextual
A leadership role exists within a specific context: a set of explicit and implicit responsibilities embedded in a given organizational culture at a particular stage of its development. And any of these aspects of the role can come to feel like baggage. A leader may feel highly capable of fulfilling their responsibilities at the outset, but a lack of growth leads to stagnancy--or hyper-growth leads to overwhelm. Responsibilities can expand without a corresponding increase in compensation or necessary resources--or responsibilities can remain static or even shrink as the organization scales up or as peers and employees jostle for a broader scope.
Leaders tend to create or opt into organizational cultures that fit with their strengths and preferences, and they exert greater influence over culture than other employees by virtue of their ability to reward desired behaviors and punish undesired ones. But even founder CEOs soon find themselves operating within a complex system that they can influence but can't control, and while organizational cultures typically change slowly, no culture is permanently fixed. So even as leaders strive to shape the culture so that it remains aligned with their personal needs, they also must respond to the influence of the culture as it evolves.
A leader's role is also strongly affected by the organization's stage of development, particularly if it's growing rapidly. The daily experience of the CEO leading three people in a single room will be very different by the time there are 30 people occupying multiple offices. It will change radically yet again when there are 300 people--or 3,000, or 30,000--dispersed even further. While most of the leaders I've worked with aspire to stay with an organization through successive periods of growth, even the most flexible and adaptive can struggle as what is required of them evolves along with the organization's needs.
Again, you may conclude that your disenchantment is a function of this particular role, and an alternative would be more suitable. But before you do, ask yourself...
- How have my responsibilities changed--or failed to change--over time?
- How would I characterize the culture, and how is it evolving over time? In what ways is it easy--and difficult--for me to conform to its expectations?
- What's changing as the organization moves through various stages of development? How do I see myself fitting into the next stage in the process?
- Looking back on my career, are there patterns in which job responsibilities, organizational culture, or company stage have contributed to--or diminished--my sense of professional fulfillment?
Even if you decide to move on and find a context better-suited to your needs, it'll be important to understand how these factors affect your relationship with a leadership role--and how you tend to respond when they (inevitably) change.
3. Structural
Some aspects of leadership roles are structural elements that derive from very common expectations that almost all systems impose on their leaders. While some of these structural elements are rewarding, others feel like baggage--and still others can be both rewarding and burdensome at the same time.
Leaders aren't just senior decision-makers or resource-allocators with authority over others. They're also avatars who embody their organizations, and they enjoy special privileges and bear special responsibilities as a result. From the outside, a leader's high visibility looks like a perk--and it can be. But it also requires a leader to always be "on" and to bear in mind that their every word, gesture, and look will be scrutinized--which can be exhausting.
While contemporary business culture abounds with references to "flat organizations" and "servant leadership," the truth is that groups require a degree of hierarchy. [1] Although this differs by nationality, industry, and organization, in most professional settings groups want leaders who understand and respond to egalitarian sensitivities while also being able to wield authority on behalf of the group--to "use thorny behavior to further the well-being and success of others," as Jerry Useem describes it. [2]
People often rise to leadership roles on the basis of their capacity for work--as individual contributors they could deliver excellence, check off every item on their to-do list, and still have time for a personal life. And yet what I've observed countless times in my practice is that even the hardest-working, most determined people can struggle with the demands of leadership because their high capacity for work meant that they never had to develop the ability to distinguish between the truly important and the merely urgent. But as Andy Grove has written, "A manager's work is never done. There is always more to be done, more that should be done, always more than can be done." [3]
And again, you may conclude that you need to seek out another leadership role, but before you do, ask yourself...
- How effectively have I fulfilled the symbolic demands of leadership?
- How effectively have I navigated the tension between egalitarianism and hierarchy?
- How effectively have I distinguished the important from the urgent? How capable am I of I determining what--and who--to ignore?
- And what steps have I taken to invest in self-care in order to replenish myself in the face of these duties?
While each leadership role will certainly differ with regard to these factors, it's likely that you'll encounter some version of them no matter where you go.
I'm not suggesting that you should remain in a leadership role that's weighing you down. But my work with leaders for more than a decade has made it clear that we can't simply look to the external situation when we become disenchanted. Even if we ultimately decide to leave, we also must look within--to understand and address the baggage we're taking with us--in order to make the most of any new opportunity. And it's possible that you just might be better off going nowhere.
Footnotes
[1] Organizational Preferences and Their Consequences (Deborah Gruenfeld and Larissa Tiedens, Chapter 33 in the Handbook of Social Psychology, 2010)
[2] Why It Pays to Be a Jerk (Jerry Useem, The Atlantic, 2015)
[3] High Output Management, page 47 (Andy Grove, 1983/1995)
For Further Reading
Weather Systems (Power, Charisma and Leadership)
Make Getting Feedback Less Stressful
Learning to Yield (Navigating Tough Conversations)
Resolving a Protracted Conflict
Conform to the Culture Just Enough
Leadership as a Performing Art
The Most Productive People Know Who to Ignore?
Not Every End Is a Goal (On Midlife Malaise)
Inspired by an earlier version that applied a similar framework in a more general context.
Photo by Martin Fisch.
