Recently, a government industry manager shared with me her frustration at not being supported by the executive level leaders in her organization in implementing the organizational wide strategic changes she was responsible for delivering. Subsequently, she was finding herself striving to operate at an executive level across the organization, failing to get management level buy in or support and feeling frustrated, burned out and resentful. This was also causing her confusion because she genuinely believes the work has value and likes the people who are frustrating and disappointing her.
Her session focused on the very real importance of understanding role clarity, even as a leader, and being able to say to herself “stop Liza” when the issue, workload or process moved out of her sphere of impact and responsibility. As leaders we have positional and personal power. Both require development in order to be able to lead effectively.
Using personal power to set clear boundaries around our role and what we are responsible for delivering is a vital and often underdeveloped and underutilized skill. Even for leaders there is a large body of work that lies outside of our responsibility. If we do not invest time in identifying where our responsibility ends, we will not be able to operate in an effective or sustainable way. We will also rob ourselves of the opportunity to acknowledge a job well done and enjoy workplace satisfaction because we will feel we have failed when in fact the opposite is true. It is of course disappointing and frustrating when what we deliver is not valued, supported or implemented. In such instances we must celebrate our achievement and success ourselves (and with our immediate team of followers) rather than expect or look for it externally.
This can also be disappointing. However, if we focus on the disappointment and see our success as failure, we rob ourselves of enjoying the fruit of our labour. If we try to force outcomes that are not in our area of responsibility and sphere of influence, we will either become frustrated at pushing the proverbial boulder up the hill or we will do work that is not ours to do. This might be appreciated and valued by those whose job it actually is (if indeed they see it as such) but you will increase your workload and stress, and very likely that of your team. This is not fair to you, and it is not fair them. The simplest strategy that can assist in this situation is developing that capacity to ask yourself one simple question “is this my job?” and if it not, let it go and move onto something that is.