What stands in the way of personal development for top executives? Yes, of course, themselves. But what specifically?
Leadership Development and Executive Coaching are a kind of adult learning. It might be assumed that the older a person, which often equates to “older,” the less receptive to learning they might be. However, based on my observations as an executive coach, that is not the case.
Willingness to change or lack of intelligence is also not a problem. Coached executives are smart, ambitious and ready to change. However, overusing these strengths is what gets in the way of your personal growth. Or more precisely: it makes your own leadership development less enjoyable and more stressful.
The top three obstacles to executive leadership development are
- a lack of understanding of what specifically needs to be developed
- a lack of understanding of how learning processes actually work, and
- a lack of measurement of progress.
Frustration begins with not knowing what needs to be developed, often called the stage of unconscious incompetence: a manager wants better results, wants the team to work more autonomously, or can be prepared to take responsibility. next step in his career, but he hasn’t yet identified what exactly he needs to improve.
Tools like 360-degree feedback, stakeholder interviews, or an MBTI assessment can easily give you the answer to the gaps that need to be closed. Once people have understood what has prevented them from being more successful, they have moved on to the next stage of competency development: conscious incompetence. They now know what has been holding them back and understand what they need to do to improve. And so they also reach the next stage of frustration because their ambition gets in the way: once they know what needs to be done, they want change to happen immediately. That’s good as far as motivation goes. However, without understanding how learning processes work, the leadership development process becomes frustrating and tedious. Ambitious managers want to achieve perfection in a new skill overnight, but this is simply not going to happen.
Strange as it may seem, everyone seems to accept that developing skills in other areas takes time: running a marathon, playing the piano, or learning a new language. But when it comes to leadership development, managers give in to the field of reality distortion and want to change the entire world in a week. Or less.
It’s amazing how adaptable we humans are, but we must accept that any serious adaptation takes a considerable amount of time. The latest from Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers we know that “the magic number for true experience (is) ten thousand hours.”
Relax, you may not need 10,000 hours to kick an unproductive habit, improve time management, or better motivate your team members. But you must be patient and not expose yourself to unnecessary frustration along the way.
Patient now? Well, here’s the third reason you’re frustrated with your leadership development: You’re not acknowledging your progress.
Have you ever been on a diet to lose weight? Then you have probably experienced that you were making daily incremental changes, too small for you to notice. Maybe you didn’t see your appearance change until your pants were too baggy, or an old friend you hadn’t known for a while told you how skinny you suddenly were. (However, sometimes we may very well hear the opposite comments…)
The same applies to learning processes: if you don’t measure your progress, you may not be aware of any progress at all. And to think that you are not making progress is frustrating.
I was working with a coaching client on time management and work effectiveness. He only realized his tremendous progress once it was time for the annual evaluation, and his boss rated him much higher than he had rated himself. What a pretty surprise! But imagine how being aware of this progress earlier would have been so much more enjoyable and how his self-confidence would have increased. Constantly underestimating your own capabilities is not only frustrating; it can lead to unnecessary and unhealthy anxiety and self-doubt.
For dieters, monitoring progress objectively is fairly easy: they strike a balance on a daily basis. Monitoring your leadership skills may take a bit more creativity, but it is possible: think about the KPIs that are linked to these skills or just ask people for feedback.
In short, here are three simple steps to make your personal growth that much more enjoyable and rewarding:
- Explore what gaps you need to close to take the next step. Very useful tools for that are 360-degree feedback, stakeholder interviews, or assessments like the Myers-Briggs type indicator. A confidant such as a coach or mentor can help you plan specific developmental steps.
- Accept that any learning process takes time. Rome was not built in a day. No one was born a teacher. Etc.
- Measure progress objectively by monitoring KPIs or getting feedback from others on a regular basis. Take one step at a time and recognize small victories.
Have fun learning!