It’s easy to get caught up in delegation when taking on a leadership position at a new job. Don’t forget how important it is to work with your team too.
The reasons to work with your team outweigh any excuse to sit back and let them do it all. Jeanne DeWitt, Chief Revenue Officer at UberConference, explains this from her perspective:
Spend time doing the work that your team actually does. Not only does this help establish you as someone who leads by example, but you also learn first-hand about all of the different challenges that people experience every day. At UberConference, we have every new member of the team spend a week as a guest member of our customer support team. As a result of those experiences, everyone is far more connected to our customers, and changes to the product, tools, and messaging are implemented immediately because that first-hand experience creates passion. If you can understand what it’s fundamentally like to be on the front lines, you have unique perspective when making larger strategic decisions and communicating them to your team.
If you’re new to leadership, heed Jeanne’s advice. If you’ve been in management for a while, you might want to refresh your relationship with your team by getting your hands dirty. Check out the link below for more.
5 Tips for New Team Leaders [Harvard Business Review]
Comments
One response to “To Be A Better Manager, Get Your Hands Dirty”
Unfortunately the big attraction to becoming a manager is so you can get “off the tools” and don’t have to get your hands dirty. Not many managers are there for altruistic reasons.