The Leader's Toolkit

001 Performing v. Leading Performers

Episode Summary

How good are you at your job? If you've been tasked with leading a team, how good are you as a leader of that team? Those are two separate skillsets -- Your performance and your skill at leading other performers. Just because you're good at your skillset (accounting, graphic design, teaching or whatever your job is) doesn't mean you're automatically good at leading people. Leading people is a skill that can be mastered with the proper resources, tools and intentionality. In this first episode, we will explore performing v. leading performers. Come on this journey with us and invite other leaders along the way.

Episode Notes

The Leader's Toolkit Podcast

Whatever your profession or trade, you have a skillset or expertise. If you're a carpenter, an accountant, a teacher, a graphic designer, a CFO, etc you have a level of performance within your job. If you could put a number to grade yourself as to how well you are performing in your job, what would you score yourself?  1 (not good at all) to 10 (expert at your job).

Let's say, for example, that you say you are a "7" as a performer within your job/skillset. Now, you've been tasked with leading a team.  If you could put a number to grade yourself as to how well you are a leader to your team, what would be your score? 1 (not good at all) to 10 (expert at your job).

Let's say, for example, that you say you are a "5" as a leader. So in this example, you are  a 7/5. These are two separate skill sets. Just because someone excels at their profession or trade does not necessarily mean they are excelling at leading their team.

Now, do an exercise where you create circles on a sheet of paper representing every team within your organization. You are probably one of many team leaders. If you evaluate each team leader, you can ultimately get an overall "Performing" v. "Leading" score for the entire organization. (Depending on how large your organization is, you may not know every team leader).

The point of this exercise is to determine how you and the other team leaders within your organization are taking seriously the job of leading teams. See a visual graphic of the Performing v. Leading Exercise.

This podcast is for anyone who leads any kind of a team and wants to increase their leadership skillset. Listen episode by episode to gain insights, wisdom, tips, tricks and tools for becoming a leader worth following.

To learn more about the GiANT Pro subscription: theleaderstoolkitpodcast.com/pro
To learn more about the GiANT Catalyst subscription:  theleaderstoolkitpodcast.com/catalyst
To find helpful resources in regards to this episode: Episode 1 Resources

We'd love to hear from you: your questions, your comments and your stories about leading.
Reach out to tracy.rader@giantworldwide.com