Should “talent” move on to manager/leader roles ?


My pal Chris Paine wrote an excellent post http://www.wombling.com/hr/should-you-be-a-manager/ which was in response to a rant on “talent” I posted a couple of days ago. He definitely got me thinking on two counts. Why did my post get more attention than usual ? and should “talent” become managers ?

First part, I think I have a simple answer. It has nothing to do with brilliance of my writing – several people have similar views and frustrations about “man vs machine”, and hence identified with the post.

I do not consider myself as “talent” – I am convinced the world at large won’t miss me if I disappeared from the face of earth tomorrow. My family (and dogs) will, my close friends probably will – but that is about it. My employer ( and past employers too, if I had continued to work there) will carry on with hardly a roadblock . I am not special – and I generally think vast majority of us are not that special when it comes to the context of jobs/careers. However, I do know many at my current job, and in most past jobs who will qualify as “special”. They will be missed, even if they can be replaced.

The fact that they will be missed should not be confused with them being irreplaceable. Most people can and should be replaced. And this is by far the criteria that differentiates “talent” that can lead, and those that cannot.

As individual contributors – it is a no brainer what talent can do, and what they want to do. But what makes them successful as managers and leaders are very different . As a leader, they have to learn to let go of a lot of things that made them special as an individual contributor. That is not easy. In fact it is pretty darn hard.

As a leader, you cannot let go of your primary skills for two reasons
1. For the most part, you might have to switch back to being an individual contributor because you cannot stand being a manager, even if you were good at it
2. To hire and retain talent, you need to be at a certain intellectual level to relate to them.

However, you cannot let your own ideas take center stage and shadow the ideas of your team. You need a heightened sense of self awareness to pull this off. And you have to deal with your own frustrations and your team’s frustrations while shielding the team and organization from each other. Did I say it is pretty darned hard?

And like every other leader – You have to be a cheer leader for your team, you need to be their biggest fan, you need to do their PR, you occassionally will even need to be their mom if situation warrants it and of course you will need to kick their butts too as needed.

Remember I mentioned about being replaceable ? That is key – mark my words. If you don’t have a trusted wing-man, you are doomed. You won’t go any place worth going. What is worse – you will spend the rest of your life bitching and moaning that your strategy is perfect, but there is no one to execute. I have no sympathy for such leaders. It is almost always something they can change. Your job does not stop after defining strategy – you need to make sure your team has someone who will drive execution, if you are not going to drive execution yourself. And you should constantly be looking for ways to remove obstacles for the people driving execution. A strategy that cannot be successfully executed is a bad strategy. This is true whether you are the leader of the lowest level team in the food chain, or if you are the person running the company itself.

A common pitfall for “talent who chooses be managers” is that they value loyalty way over performance. This is the one area where I think non-talent managers have a slight advantage. I have a hypothesis about this. Talent can out think others by a few moves. So when they make a decision that they have to explain to others – either they need a team that is at their intellectual wavelength, or they need a team that is super loyal to them and will rush to conquer the hill without questioning. If neither condition is met, it will frustrate the leader to no end. And since humans like the path of least resistance – they just tend to value loyalty more than performance. Over time, they inadvertantly surround themselves with people who won’t stand up to them. From that point – it is a high speed race to the bottom. Plain for everyone else to see and keep away from being roadkill, except for the leader and his immediate team.

Absolute power corrupts absolutely – and when that power is vested with “talent who chose to be managers” – the evil effect is a few multiples stronger.

Does that mean talent should never become managers ? No – I do think the world can use some more “talent turned manager” people. Why? because when they put their hearts into it – we will see a type of management/leadership excellence that is not commonly seen . There are a few things that could enhance their chance of success.
1. Have a support system in place that will challenge them on merit, not loyalty.
2. Let them experience management sooner in career – it takes time to develop people management skills. Leading 5 people is not the same as leading 5000 people through many managers reporting to you. Don’t let them wake up one day at the deep end- ease them in.
3. Along the way, keep the option to return to individual contributor roles if management does not work

That’s it – what do you think, Chris ? Over to you !

PS: After a long time, I typed a blog on my PC – not iPhone 🙂

The cost of precision in BI


What percentage of decisions need precise data right upfront ? My guess is less than 10% or even lower .

A big decision for an average person is purchasing a home . Having gone through that exercise in two countries – and knowing many people who have done this before and after me , I am convinced that the data needed to make that decision did not need much precision . Based on your financial position – you could judge affordability within a plus or minus range of some amount . Another factor was school district rating – how many of us will care if the score was “9 out of 10” vs “10 out of 10” ?

Decision making is progressive – you find a “cluster” based on some characteristics like location , price etc . As you narrow down – you cluster again – flooring , yard size etc comes into play ( but again you don’t need super precision – if I am looking for a 2500 sqft house , I won’t overlook a 2400 sqft house because it didn’t precisely meet my criteria ) . And then comes the ultimate short list that needs some precision , and a final decision that needs excellent precision since you need to pay it to the seller .

Some version of this process is followed in all decision making , including sales , marketing, purchasing etc . Apart from legal and financial – i think almost no business function needs the type of upfront precision that it has chased since the beginning of time .

Look at an average BI project in enterprise world – 90% of time is spent on plumbing data – designing schemas , defining exception workflows , writing transformations and so on . Remaining 10% is used to make reports useful to its audience . This is unavoidable because BI is very static in nature – even what is called as-hoc analysis is limited by schemas in back end . In short – even the best BI solutions cannot mimic how human beings make decisions .

The quest for extreme upfront precision is what works against BI being useful – ironic as it might sound . And BI has no chance of being seriously disrupted till it stops expecting tightly defined schemas on back end , and high precision right upfront in all cases .

Context is way more valuable than precision . That is how we make decisions eventually in real life . And context changes with time – which means BI has no chance to keep up given its hard dependency on static things . BI world needs to think in terms of real world entities – not in some arbitrarily defined data models .

Good news is that technology and data science have progressed enough to do that in (more or less) repeatable and cost effective ways . Bad news is that the world of BI won’t go to the promised land without blood curdling shrieks , kicking and screaming .

Keep calm – our world of BI is changing , hopefully for the better .

Talent cannot be managed


Most people can and should be managed in an organization – but not talent . And talent is not a word that should be used in a light hearted and generalist way . That is how it loses relevance .

Interestingly, I did not learn this originally from corporate world or business school – I learned this from training and working with dogs . My intention is not to compare dogs to humans – just that I learned something from my hobby that empirically seem to also apply in my real career .

Most novice trainers go around looking for smart and intelligent dogs . What they don’t realize is that you can’t train smart dogs with novice training skills . It is one of those things that people won’t learn without making their own mistakes . Been there done that and learned , I think I learned at least . The dog for novice trainers is the one that is highly motivated by food , and an over eagerness to please the owner . That is – a pretty dumb dog , the opposite of an intelligent dog . Once they are trained – the dumb dogs will perform spectacularly to please their handler – but they usually can’t think for themselves to save their lives .

That is pretty much the case with management too . If you really want to work with smart people – you cannot manage them . They don’t thrive under management . They need collaboration and leadership . Set them in a direction , and get out of their way . Check in periodically and let them know you can be approached for help whenever they need . And then don’t let them down when they come to you .

“Talent” is not scalable – there is no such thing as a talented team of 100 people . I wish there was but I have never seen or heard of it . So be prepared to run smaller teams if you want to work with real talent .

“Talent” doesn’t mix with non talent – the moment they mix with people less smart than them , they lose interest . That is when turf wars and politics and all start – and they will out wit everyone else , even if the result is that the team will not deliver on goals . So if you decide that talent is what you are after – you need to be super careful as a leader to not lower your hiring standards .

“Talent” is fiercely loyal to their own ideas – and this is why they cannot be managed . It is a test of character for the leader to see if you can gain their agreement on a team goal . Or at least get them to disagree , but commit . And you will be the biggest idiot if you don’t consider their ideas carefully – because “I said so” is not what they consider as rational criteria . If you dismiss their idea – you need to beat them to the punch at an intellectual level they are at . Very very hard to do .

“Talent thrives on loyalty” – they value integrity in their leaders . If you fight for them when they needed , they will usually lay down on the tracks for you. Conversely – screw them over and they will screw you over harder than your worst nightmare . Don’t make promises you can’t keep and don’t give them standard company lines as excuses . They know exceptions can be made almost in every case . If they suspect you are not doing everything for them – that loyalty goes away in a hurry .

“Talent” will challenge you every step of the way. Don’t hire them if you can’t deal with it constantly . They will make you think when you would rather sleep or have a beer . It is not easy – you are either in the game with them , or you are in the cheap stands . No bench in this game. Always on !

“Talent” doesn’t tolerate breach of trust – they know that they won’t always get managers who are as smart as them . But as long as they trust the leader – this is not an issue . The issue is that they won’t usually give you a second chance if you break their trust . Be open and fair as a leader . And be consistent in being open and fair.

“Talent” needs direction – especially because they are quite capable of thinking about many ways to do things . And they will get bored if there is not enough challenge in their jobs . They will also be pissed off if you set unrealistic goals . It is a fine balance to strike .

“Talent” needs money , but money won’t keep them there for long – these folks don’t come cheap and most of them know their value quite well . But that is the easier part . The harder part is retaining them and keeping them positive without turning them into bitter employees .

“Talent” will walk away – but they probably will give you some time to get your act together . They might even politely remind you that they are losing patience . But they won’t sit around for ever to bitch and moan . They know that they are in demand irrespective of the economy or general market conditions . So they will walk away . And they won’t usually come back if you do counter offers – because they would have computed that in their decision making process before they chose to walk . So if they are leaving , allow them to leave on pleasant terms . You never know when you need each other . It is a small world .

Nothing but problems in general – so why bother with talent at all then ? Because these are the few people who will take the big swings and hit home runs . And that is what separates you at the end from competitors . If you are happy with status quo – don’t worry about talent

But here is the thing – you need the rest of the organization to work at peak efficiency so that the “talent” can be given the freedom to make big swings . If the rest of the organization is not disciplined – it is reckless to just depend on big swings to change your fortunes . That is hope – hope is not a strategy . There is a management concept called “policy by lapse” – that is not an admirable strategy , to say the least .

This is where rubber meets the road for companies with big innovation agendas . They tend to over do it by trying to light as many fires as they can – hoping that something will catch on . In this process – they forget that “talent” can easily deal with it , but others probably cannot do it to the same degree . And when “talent” sees the lack of differentiation in what got assigned to them – their passion will evaporate. And pure recklessness results – with no goals being met . The smarter companies know what part of the team needs to be industrialized and what is the portion of the team that can be allowed to make those big swings .

And in the process of (mis)managing “talent” – the real hard job is to take adequate care of everyone else . Today’s bills are paid by everyone else . “Talent” can only pay tomorrows bills . And every leader needs to keep that in mind .

Now , which part of the team would you like to lead ? All “talent” , All “everyone else”, or a mix ?