Does it take knowing how to lead? There is no shortage of how-to books that provide instruction on new skills. Search “management” on Amazon and you’ll get over 600,000 options. Certainly information is important and learning from those who have walked the path before us can be very valuable. But focusing on knowing can also be a trap. For example, my client has long prided himself on being a subject-matter expert: the go-to guy for answers in his field. While it’s comfortable to stick to what’s worked in the past, he wants his peers to relate to him differently now. He sees that clinging to that identity can keep him from contributing at a new level. Among the skills he will need at the next stage, knowing will be one of them, but he knows he must take another step.

So is stepping up about doing different things? Absolutely! As accountabilities change, actions must follow. And yet, trying to navigate a role change solely by laboring to check off a long to-do list may lead to a frenzied lack of focus. I encourage clients to select one or two activities that are high leverage. In order to shift how he’s seen by his coworkers, my client has chosen to prioritize organizational communication. This definitely requires some doing: finding the right forums and developing the right message. Communicating plans and progress is not just about creating a better PowerPoint graphic or a well-articulated story. You have to provide enough detail to instill confidence while simultaneously connecting to the big picture that makes the information strategic. That calls for doing things well, but with the addition of something greater.

I believe that succeeding in a new role requires conscious steps: from knowing—to doing—to being. Leadership calls forth a new way of being—a sense of presence and clarity. Dartmouth administrator Wiley Souba suggests that this sort of transformation is challenging stuff. He writes that “we can ‘get our arms around’ our behaviors and develop or modify them, but our being is more difficult to grasp; it is less ‘embraceable;’ we don’t know ‘being,’ it’s just who we are” (from Souba’s February 2011 article “The Being of Leadership” in the journal Philosophy, Ethics, and Humanities in Medicine).

While Souba’s article specifically focused on physicians and health care executives, his “Foundational Pillars of Being a Leader” offer a helpful context for leaders in any situation:

My client has begun this process. He is becoming curious about his authentic self as he moves beyond familiarity and comfort. He’s studying his Myers-Briggs report to explore his natural preferences and he’s aligning his convictions with his actions. He is laying a new foundation for being leadership. And that is a great step toward real sustainability.

Photo by Jared Tarbell

The recent news about WikiLeaks (see NPR for a detailed recap) reminds me of one of my coaching clients. You might say she had a sort of “leadership leak.” She is a fairly new manager in a small, growing organization with a culture that is very flexible, entrepreneurial, and all about employee empowerment. That was almost her downfall.

The values of her organization encourage people to take initiative, bring themselves fully to work, and make things happen. And it pays off—the people who work there are dedicated to the mission and their results are impressive. Our colleagues at the Center for Creative Leadership might call this boundary-spanning leadership. It’s a type of management that seeks to break down barriers that limit our ability to succeed. It is effective when departments feel walled in, like grain in silos. And it can foster healthy new forms of interaction at times when the levels of an organization seem impermeable. For my client though, she suddenly felt shaky about the foundations of the very management structure she had always depended on.

A healthy boundary-spanning culture works well for many people. In fact it is common today for organizations to seek to create an open, participative environment where information is shared for the good of the whole and employees are creative and collaborative in meeting client needs. But in the case of WikiLeaks, an attempt to make documents more widely accessible brought embarrassing revelations to light. Now the country’s diplomatic corps are scrambling to come to terms with this new transparency. Similarly, my client is learning a few key lessons about boundaries.

Specifically, her “leak” sprang from a very ambitious and capable employee in her department. He regularly seeks to go above and beyond the strict definition of his responsibilities—the kind of team member you love, right? Right … but only up to a point.

One day my client found herself blindsided by an untimely decision made by her superior. It was a decision that fell within her responsibility and that she was actively collaborating with others to finalize. Her employee had short-circuited a “chain of command” (although that’s overstating it for her organization) and my client was the one who got shocked. To be fair, her employee was simply seeking clarity and following a habit he had developed: to go wherever he could get answers in the moment.

As leaders, it is natural to relax when we have talented performers on our team. Situational Leadership  teaches us to support employees once they demonstrate their capability and succeed outside the box (learn more in this brief, helpful essay by Bernard Erven—a PDF document). It is only when free-flowing activity becomes chaotic and unproductive that we need to re-establish a code of conduct with more targeted direction. That was what my client was facing, and in our coaching sessions, she realized that she had been vague about roles and scope. We determined that she needed to follow the UCSF faculty recommendation that workplace boundaries be “carefully negotiated in an open discussion about responsibilities, goals, and priorities.”

Consider the adage: good fences make good neighbors. Leaders who assert their responsibility and authority create a container where employees can more accurately channel their energy and creativity. It’s similar to using a bellows, which contains and channels air to fuel a fire: it accelerates the process. Once my client declared her leadership position, reinforced productive boundaries, and outlined her expectations for coordination, she and her employee achieved a mutual understanding for how to work together without “leaks.”

Photo by dougtone

During our conversation, he shared why he wanted an executive coach: he wasn’t getting the naked truth about how things were really going within the organization. And he knew that had something to do with him. People around him were quick to say “yes” to his requests, to applaud his decisions, to placate him at any sign of frustration… but not necessarily to tell him any “cons” along with the “pros.”

On the one hand, he enjoyed his reputation as a daunting leader. He knew, in fact, just how to use it to his advantage: cutting through stalemates with suppliers, assertively breaking new ground for the company’s direction, commanding unquestionable respect from Wall Street analysts and his executive board. But it had also dawned on him that his imposing ways shut most people down (and not just at work; at home too). As a result, he realized he was blocking the way to the honest relationships that would give him the candid critique he needed to run his organization well.

So, what do you do when your presence is too big as a leader? Imagine your energy — your presence — as one of those inflatables you see in parades; if you’re already filling up the room, no one else can get in. It’s common to talk about “right-sizing” the organization, but rarely do we consider right-sizing our energy to fit the situation at hand. Right-sizing begins with becoming aware of three simple, yet powerful leadership tools already at our disposal: our language, our bodies, and our emotions.

Take, for instance, our CEO — let’s call him Mr. Big. I listened in as he spoke to his leadership team a little later. “I want,” “I need,” and “I am” dominated the conversation. He spoke quickly with a rigid jaw and crossed arms. Everything about him projected command and control. And that would not be bad, by the way, if he were facing the proverbial burning platform and dictating do-or-die steps for the organization’s immediate survival. But as I eavesdropped, what he really wanted was for his leaders to form and embrace a new vision of company success. The problem? There was no room — given the force of his words, his almost aggressive posture, and the size of his energy — for anyone else to play.

And, worse, overbearing leadership styles tend to correlate with workers’ “poorer individual ratings of vitality” as well as “long-lasting stress,” “emotional exhaustion” and “greater risk of leaving the workplace due to poor health.” An over-sized leadership presence not only quells the naked truth Mr. Big wanted from his managers and employees, it threatens to crush the very effectiveness of these people.

What executives like Mr. Big could experiment with — say in coaching sessions or role playing with trusted colleagues — is to become more vulnerable and curious. That means physically opening up your stance, trying postures that are more encouraging (e.g., arms unfolded, a sincere smile), and gestures that invite collaboration. In speech, it means leading with more questions than answers, making space for others’ voices to be heard, and slowing down to a speaking pace that’s easy to follow. The key is to actually do these things, to practice and make them a real part of your leadership toolkit.

Once your speech patterns and physical presence take on this right-sized energy, you will likely find your whole attitude and demeanor adjusting to a more appropriate level. And that’s the sort of emotional tone which will create a field in which others can participate. Like parade inflatables, the size of your energy is adjustable. Sometimes it’s better to let a little air out and make room for others to join in the parade!

Photos by Lord Jim (top) and Roebot