Beliefs That Help a Leader Move

Up to Level 3

Most of the people who fail to move up in leadership don't make it because they never understand the importance of building relationships with the people they work with and gaining their permission to lead them. The Permission level is foundational to good leadership, but it is not your ultimate goal. If you have gained the confidence of those you lead, and are recognized as a person who cares about them, then it's time to start thinking the way a Level 3 leader does. To begin that shift, keep in mind the following three things.

1. Relationships Alone Are Not Enough Although the Permission level may bring you and your team great satisfaction relationally, if you stay on Level 2 and never advance, you won't really prove yourself as a leader. The good news is that if you've connected with your team, you now have some influence with them. The question now is: What are you going to do with that influence? True leadership takes people somewhere so that they can accomplish something. That requires a leader to connect people's potential to their performance.

2. Building Relationships Requires

Twofold Growth

For relationships to be meaningful, people must not only grow toward each other but also grow with each other. Growing toward each other requires compatibility. Growing with each other requires intentionality.

If you are married or in a significant long-term relationship, then you probably understand how these dynamics come into play. When you first met your partner, you moved toward one another, based on attraction, common ground, and shared experiences. You established the relationship. However, a relationship can't last if you never go beyond those initial experiences. To stay together, you need to sustain the relationship. That requires common growth. If you don't grow together, there's a very good chance you may grow apart. Similarly, if you are to have any staying power as a leader, you must grow toward and with your people. Just because you've developed good relationships with your people, don't think that you're done on the relational side. There is still more work to do.

3. Achieving Vision as a Team Is Worth

Risking Relationships

Building relationships with people can be hard work. But to succeed as a leader, you have to be willing to risk what you've developed relationally for the sake of the bigger picture. Leaders must be willing to sacrifice for the sake of the vision. If achieving a vision is worth building a team, it is also worth risking your relationships. Building relationships and then risking them to advance the team creates tension for a leader. That tension will force you to make a choice: shrink the vision or stretch the people to reach it.

If you want to do big things, you need to take people out of their comfort zones. They might fail. They might implode. They might relieve their own tension by fighting you or quitting. Risk always changes relationships. If you risk and win, then your people gain confidence. You have shared history that makes the relationship stronger. Trust increases. And the team is ready to take on even more difficult challenges. However, if you risk and fail, you lose relational credibility with your people and you will have to rebuild the relationships. Risk is always present in leadership. Anytime you try to move forward, there is risk. Even if you're doing the right things, your risk isn't reduced. But there is no progress without risk, so you need to get used to it.

The bottom line is that you can slow down early in your leadership to build relationships on Level 2, or you can forge ahead, trying to skip straight to Level 3-but if you do, you will have to backtrack later to build those relationships. And you need to recognize that doing so will slow your momentum, and it can actually take you longer to build the team than if you did it the right way in the first place.

The key link between people and the company is the leader they work with! That leader is the face, heart, and hands of the company on a day-to-day basis. If that leader connects and cares, that makes a huge difference.

Level 3

PRODUCTION.

Making Things Happen Separates Real

Leaders from Wannabes

The Production level is where leadership really takes off and shifts into another gear. Production qualifies and separates true leaders from people who merely occupy leadership positions. Good leaders always make things happen. They get results. They can make a significant impact on an organization. Not only are they productive individually, they also are able to help the team produce. This ability gives Level 3 leaders confidence, credibility, and increased influence.

No one can fake Level 3. Either you're producing for the organization and adding to its bottom line (whatever that may be) or you're not. Level 3 leaders are self-motivated and productive. As a result, they create momentum and develop an environment of success, which makes the team better and stronger.

Another benefit of leadership on Level 3 is that it attracts other highly productive people. Producers are attractive to other producers. They respect one another. They enjoy collaborating. They get things done together. That ultimately creates growth for the organization.

Some people never move up from Level 2, Permission, to Level 3, Production. Why? They can't seem to produce results. When that is the case, it's usually because they lack the self-discipline, work ethic, organization, or skills to be productive. However, if you desire to go to higher levels of leadership, you simply have to produce. There is no other way around it.

The Upside of Production

You Now Have Leadership Credibility

With the addition of Production, leadership really begins to hit its stride. Having built a foundation of strong relationships, leaders who get results dramatically improve their team and organization. There are so many upsides to Level 3. Here are six of them.

1. Leadership Production Gives Credibility

to the Leader

The ability to produce results has always been the line people must be able to cross to be successful. That line is also what qualifies someone for leadership. Peter Drucker, often described as the father of modern management, expressed it this way: "There are two types of people in the business community: those who produce results and those who give you reasons why they didn't."

Authentic leaders know the way and show the way to productivity. They take their people where they want them to go-they don't send them there. They are more like tour guides than travel agents. They live on their performance, not their potential. They lead by example. And their ability to get results tends to silence their critics and build their reputations. People admire and usually welcome achievers who deliver the goods-who get results.

2. Leadership Production Models and Sets

the Standard for Others

Productive leaders set an example for the people they lead, and their productivity sets the standard for the team. President Abraham Lincoln recognized this. During the American Civil War, the president relieved General John C. Fremont of his command. He said it was for this reason: "His cardinal mistake is that he isolates himself and allows no one to see him." Lincoln knew that leaders need to be among their people, inspiring them with their abilities, letting them see what the standard should be for their performance.

Some leaders make the same mistake as some parents. They expect people to do as they say, not as they do. But here's the problem: people do what people see. If you want dedicated, thoughtful, productive people on your team, you must embody those characteristics.

Take time to list all the qualities you desire in your team members. Then compare your own personal qualities to those on the list. Wherever you desire a quality in others that you don't possess yourself, create an action statement describing what you must do to possess the trait you'd like to see.

3. Leadership Production Brings Clarity and

Reality to the Vision

Good leaders constantly communicate the vision of the organization. They do it clearly, creatively, and continually. But that doesn't mean that everyone who receives the message understands and embraces it. The Production level of leadership communicates the vision through action, which helps people understand it in ways they may not have before. When followers see positive results and see goals being met, they get a clearer picture of what it means to fulfill the vision.

Level 3 leaders help their people see what productivity looks like. And with each day of productivity, the team gets one step closer to making the vision a reality. That encourages members of the team. It validates their efforts. It makes the vision that much clearer. And clarity is compelling. Productivity also expands the vision, because with increased confidence and skill, the people doing the work recognize that they can actually accomplish more than they may have believed was possible.

4. Leadership Production Solves a Mult.i.tude

of Problems

Many people in leadership positions try to solve problems by using systems. Or they pay others to try to solve problems for them. But the truth is, leaders cannot delegate the solving of problems to someone else. They have to be active in breaking through obstacles, putting out fires, correcting mistakes, and directing people. Leaders on the Production level do that. And once their effectiveness becomes contagious and spreads throughout the team, productivity begins to solve many problems-many more than managers or consultants ever will.

Productive organizations led by Level 3 leaders are hard to beat. Their effectiveness is high, and so is their morale. Productivity is inspiring. People who feel good about themselves often produce good results.

5. Leadership Production Creates Momentum When well-led organizations sustain high morale and high productivity over time, they gain momentum, which is any leader's best friend. Momentum helps a leader do anything and everything more easily. That's why I call it the great exaggerator. Without momentum, everything is harder to do than it should be. With it, everything is easier, and your performance is actually better than your capability should make it. For that reason I often advise leaders to spend less time trying to fix problems and more trying to create momentum.

Production-level leaders understand momentum and use it to the organization's advantage. They also understand that there are three types of people when it comes to momentum: Momentum Makers- Producers who make things happen.

Momentum Takers-People who go along for the ride.

Momentum Breakers-People who cause problems and hurt morale.

As a leader, you need to put the majority of your time and energy into the momentum makers and place them strategically in the organization so that they make the greatest impact. Enlist their aid to help lead the momentum takers as you motivate them. Meanwhile, have candid conversations with the momentum breakers. Give them a chance to change their att.i.tude and become productive members of the team. However, if they fail to rise up to the challenge, move them off of the team. If that is impossible, then isolate them from the rest of the team to minimize the damage they can do.

If you build solid permissional relationships on top of a foundation of positional rights and add the results of productivity, you will gain momentum. And when you do, you'll find that your work comes to fruition more quickly.

6. Leadership Production Is the Foundation

for Team Building