Are you an accidental leader?

When you’re scaling a business it can feel as though the need to think of yourself as a leader has crept up on you. After all, most people set out to make their business a success rather than out of an egoistic need to be at the helm.

It’s not uncommon, therefore, for people on the scale up journey to end up as accidental leaders, leading by default rather than design and experiencing myriad challenges as a result. This can be especially common in fast growth organisations where the scale or scope of the challenge combined with the pace of change means that getting things done often takes precedent over stopping to think about how you might do them.

As a business grows it’s common to find yourself accountable to more, and increasingly demanding, stakeholders. With a larger team below you to manage and weightier targets to deliver on, this creates more than its fair share of growing pains. And then comes the realisation that the speed of business growth has left your own professional development back in the starting blocks and now you need to catch up.

At this point there is a real need to get intentional about the sort of leader you want and need to be so that you can avoid some of the downsides of accidental leadership and become the leader your business really needs.

Let’s take a look at some of the challenges you might face if you continue to operate as an accidental leader…

Lower confidence

When you are in a position of new leadership, you may feel as though you can’t fully own your space or feel confident in your abilities. That in turn can limit your ability to enjoy or even succeed in your role.

A feeling of uncertainty

Often, newly senior leaders experience a loss of identity as the business takes on a different shape and they perceive the need to be a different person to the one they were before. This can lead to increasing uncertainty about your role, as your previous identity feels like it’s slipping away, particularly if you don’t intentionally manage your personal and professional growth to bridge the gap. 

We no longer feel we belong

It’s a very human thing to want to belong. When your new role requires you to step up and out, away from the fold as it were, it can make you feel vulnerable and exposed. No one wants to seem like they’ve had a personality transplant, particularly if the result is to no longer be accepted as part of the group. This is especially acute for small teams that grow fast as this can lead to the pack splitting out as people change. 

The magic gets lost

The chances are in a business that reaches a level of success in order to be able to scale, there was a magic that got you there. A lot of that may have been down to the dynamic of the small team leading the way. There’s a very real chance that, as your behaviour shifts as a leader the team will adapt and change to accommodate and not always in the best or healthiest way for the business

Fear of exposure becomes more acute

When you put your head above the parapet and take the lead there’s inevitable exposure. Being higher means you’ve further to fall and you need firm footing to avoid falling or getting inadvertently knocked off your perch. 

The need to remain authentic creates tension

Sometimes, out of a very reasonable need for authenticity, leaders don’t want to appear to change too much – or as one client recently put it they ‘don’t want to turn into a weirdo’! So they find themselves resisting the changes they know they need to make to step into the leader they need to be. This creates tension, in yourself and the business. 

A lack of leadership creates drift

Accidental leaders often favour flat leadership structures and teams. Whilst this can work well, it shouldn’t mean that there is no strength of strategic direction or communication around that. Without clarity a team will struggle to focus and maintain forward momentum and yet many accidental leaders shy away from being super clear about what they want for fear of stifling creativity or appearing too demanding.

So how do you know if you’re an accidental leader?

Firstly if you’ve found yourself in a leadership position without intentionally seeking it out, that’s a giveaway and not at all uncommon. Many successful business leaders have experienced this at some point. For many of my clients, the role of leader was not their primary aim. In fact, it can end up being something tricky that needs to be navigated alongside all of the other things that need to be worked out through the scale-up journey. 

Spot the symptoms - There are some key symptoms of accidental leadership that commonly show up, here’s a few:

Hiding

When you don’t feel comfortable in your leadership position, you may avoid interacting with your team or stakeholders. 

The risk: This can lead to misunderstandings, lack of communication, and a lack of trust. 

Waiting

You may feel that you lack the necessary knowledge or experience to make important decisions so you hold back, maybe until your hand is forced or abdicating altogether. 

The risk: This inevitably creates delays or missed opportunities and reduces confidence your team has in your ability to be decisive at the right level.

Inconsistency

You may struggle with setting expectations or holding your team to account. You might have a tendency to react rather than respond. 

The risk: This can lead to the team seeing different ‘versions’ of you which in turn leads to frustration, uncertainty and a lack of confidence in your leadership.

Working in the weeds

You may still feel more comfortable with ‘doing’ rather than ‘leading’.

The risk: You micro manage your team creating frustration in them,  bottlenecks in the business and overwhelm for you. It also stands in the way of team members developing and experiencing the necessary level of empowerment they need to get the job done. 

Bottom line, people want and need to feel led, especially in times of high growth and change. It gives them a sense of safety and when you’re working at the edge of your comfort zone and taking risks daily you need to know that someone that is comfortable with their role is holding things together. If you’re invisible, inconsistent, or taking over the detail, your team won’t feel safe. They will be focussing on the wrong things, stepping into the vacuum, arse covering and keeping themselves safe.

Leading from the front gives your team the space to focus on the important things they need to deliver. To do that you need to be leading on purpose - with an intentional leadership style.

By developing key leadership skills, focussing on being visible and consistent, empowering others, and building relationships, accidental leaders can become confident and effective, inspiring and motivating their teams to achieve great things.

It can be really difficult to make this transition without external support. Coaching and leadership development can help you to get from where you are now to where you need to be quickly and help you build your confidence along the way. If you suspect you might be an accidental leader and need help to build a more intentional leadership style that will allow you to step up, drop me a line on hello@rebeccamorley.co.uk or book a call at https://rebeccamorley.as.me/intro.