A key to becoming the best leader you can be
As a leader, people often regard you as a success.
But that doesn’t make you immune from self-doubt, comfortable with uncertainty, confident to engage in conflict, or be able to see complex issues from a variety of perspectives.
It’s not uncommon for leaders to suffer from ‘imposter syndrome’ – feeling as though you don’t belong in your role or that others might discover your inadequacies at any moment. Many of us can’t say ‘no’ to our boss and take on too much responsibility. Or find it hard to hold staff accountable for their actions.
Growing your mental capacity to deal with these kinds of challenges is what is called vertical development.
Unlike horizontal development (where you gain knowledge through an ‘event’ such as attending a seminar, reading a book or completing some study), vertical development is gained through personal ‘experience’ where you deliberately practice responding differently from how you have in the past.
At Spring Leadership, we focus on supporting you through these growth experiences. Instead of simply filling your mental cup with more knowledge, we help you to expand the cup itself. It’s about changing how you think, not just what you know.
Why is this important?
Leaders – for better or worse – have a profound impact on their entire organisation. The executive tier sets the ceiling for what those around them are likely to achieve. Employees often feel suffocated if leaders aren’t able to create space for them to fulfil their own developmental potential. Many conflicts, and reasons why people leave an organisation, come back to how we individually make sense of things. Our own developmental capacity can create a chasm in understanding that we are unable to cross.
The modern world is also more complex, uncertain and ambiguous than ever before. We value workplaces that are diverse and inclusive, where people can be agile and innovate. But we need leaders with the mental capacity to handle such environments, who can see and honour multiple perspectives that might differ from their own without simply dismissing them or judging them as wrong.
That ability to see many shades of grey (rather than merely black and white) allows leaders to address challenges in new, more sophisticated ways and explore options they would previously have been blind to.
There is a spectrum of vertical development that we can all move along.
At an early stage, we tend to impulsively ‘react’ to situations based on habit and emotion. At a more advanced stage, we can mindfully choose how to ‘respond’ in the moment in order to achieve the outcome we desire.
A good example of this is how we deal with feedback.
Leaders who are at an early stage of development tend to experience feedback as an attack or disapproval and react defensively. Those who are at mid-stages of development tend to be more open to accepting feedback, especially if it helps them to achieve their goals and improve. While leaders with more advanced capacity will welcome and invite feedback, regarding it as an essential part of learning and not fundamentally different from praise.
How we deal with conflict is another great example.
It can be viewed as a fight that has winners and losers – people at this early stage tend to avoid conflict or seek harmony as a way to maintain relationships. Those further along the spectrum are able to recognise their own contribution to conflicts and develop the capacity to negotiate and compromise. While those at the later stages view conflict as a source of deep insight; they can gracefully interact with all parties to influence and address the disagreement.
The great news is we can nurture our vertical development at any age, or stage, of our careers.
Investing in your vertical development will give you more options to deal with any situation that arises. Growing your mental capacity enables you to take a bigger perspective – across your organisation, society or even generations to come.
Our task, as vertical development coaches, is to help you get up on a metaphorical balcony and look at your situation from a different perspective. We support you to embrace real life growth experiences so you can show up more effectively. Regularly reflecting on those experiences, and their outcomes, is key to helping you truly learn and develop.
For some people, moving from one stage of development to the next might take years, or even decades. Without the right support in place, many of us will plateau and never reach the later stages.
Yet your developmental capacity affects everything you are able to think and do. So if you ever feel like you’re in over your head, then vertical development is worth investing in. It can give you the freedom to see, and act on, a wider variety of options in every challenge or scenario you face.
Ready to take the next step in your vertical development journey?
We warmly invite you to:
have a read of our Spring Magazine.
discover your current stage of development by taking one of our adult development assessments.
contact our friendly team today for a complimentary chat to explore how we can help you shift from offering your people leadership training (i.e. knowledge transfer) to true leadership development that supports your people to become more effective in these fast-changing, complex and uncertain times.