New Skills That Leaders Must Acquire

From the Marshall Memo #438

In this thoughtful Harvard Business Review article, consultant and IMD professor Michael Watkins describes “seven seismic shifts” that leaders must make when they are promoted from narrow functional responsibilities to leading an entire enterprise.

• Specialist to generalist – The challenge is quickly learning the mental models, tools, and vocabulary of a number of different units in the organization. The danger is over-managing those within one’s comfort zone and under-managing the others. “Leaders must be able to speak the language of all the functions and translate for them when necessary,” says Watkins. “And critically, leaders must know the right questions to ask and the right metrics for evaluating and recruiting people to manage areas in which they themselves are not experts.” 

• Analyst to integrator – A leader must go beyond analyzing the specifics of a particular area and make decisions based what’s good for the entire organization. “The skills required have less to do with analysis and more to do with understanding how to make trade-offs and explain the rationale for those decisions,” says Watkins. 

• Tactician to strategist – It’s easy for a newly appointed leader to get lost in the weeds of meetings and day-to-day decisions and fail to develop big-picture strategies. Watkins says new leaders need to learn: (a) level shifting – knowing when to focus on details, when to focus on the big picture, and seeing the links between them; (b) pattern recognition (seeing important causal relationships and separating the signal from the noise); and (c) mental simulation (anticipating how various parties will respond to what you do, predicting their actions and reactions, and deciding on the best course of action). 

• Bricklayer to architect – “As leaders move up to the enterprise level, they become responsible for designing and altering the architecture of their organization,” says Watkins, 

“– its strategy, structure, processes, and skill bases. To be effective organizational architects, they need to think in terms of systems. They must understand how the key elements of the organization fit together and not naively believe… that they can alter one element without thinking through the implications for all the others.” 

• Problem solver to agenda setter – Leaders are often chosen because they are good at solving problems, but when they become organizational leaders, they “must focus less on solving problems and more on defining which problems the organization should be tackling,” says Watkins. The array of problems and opportunities is “head-spinning”, and the leader’s challenge is to set the agenda, make good decisions, and delegate responsibility appropriately. 

• Warrior to diplomat – Many leaders’ previous experience in the trenches doesn’t prepare them to deal at the strategic level with multiple stakeholders. To do that well, they need to develop their skills at negotiation, persuasion, conflict management, and alliance building. 

• Supporting cast member to lead role – Top leaders must quickly get used to being in the limelight, which requires keeping one’s guard up at all times. “Managers at all levels are role models to some degree,” says Watkins. “But at the enterprise level, their influence is magnified, as everyone looks to them for vision, inspiration, and cues about the ‘right’ behaviors and attitudes. For good or ill, the personal styles and quirks of senior leaders are infectious, whether they are observed directly by employees or indirectly transmitted from their reports to the level below and on down through the organization.” A vital skill is developing self-awareness and taking the time to be empathetic with what subordinates are thinking and feeling. 

“How Managers Become Leaders: Seven Seismic Shifts of Perspective and Responsibility” by Michael Watkins in Harvard Business Review, June 2012 (Vol. 90, #6, p. 64-72), no e-link