In Stage 6, the leader is ideally spending 45 percent of their time and energy wearing the Visionary Face, 50 percent wearing the Manager Face, and five percent wearing the Specialist Face.
Stage 6 is essentially equal parts providing the vision for the company and managing leaders in executing on that vision.
The leader is still spending half of their time and energy wearing the Manager Face; yet Stage 6 marks a distinct change from prior Stages in how the Manager Face is worn. The leader shifts from managing managers to managing leaders who are managing managers. Those managers in turn are overseeing the staff and the work. In the same way that the leader developed, trained, and hired strong managers in prior stages, they must now focus on developing, training, and hiring a strong Leadership Team.
The Stage 6 leader is spending almost an equal portion of time and energy wearing the Visionary Face. For the first time in the Stages of Growth, the leader must guide the Leadership Team to create the vision for the organization. A clear vision can then be communicated by the Leadership Team to the managers, who then communicate it with the staff. The sheer size of the organization makes it critical for the Leadership Team to tie the big-picture vision back to the daily work being performed by the organization to maintain staff buy-in.
The Specialist Face should only occupy 5% of the leader’s time and energy. While this is the face least worn by the leader, it is no less important. The leader still has experience that can benefit the organization. Furthermore, a leader who is too far removed from the organization’s business risks losing touch with the on-the-ground reality. This creates a blind spot that can lead to poor strategic decisions and a loss of trust from the staff.
The change from Stage 5 to Stage 6 can be especially difficult for a leader who is also the founder of the company. By this point, the founder is long removed from the daily operations of the organization and may not enjoy the role of leading so many people. In fact, a founder’s inability to align themselves to the Three Faces of a Leader is one of the reasons it is common to bring in a professional CEO in Stage 6.
The common misalignment in this Stage comes from a leader who wants to maintain a higher allocation to the Manager or Specialist Faces, not wanting to give up operational oversight, which can result in a frustrated Leadership Team that wants to take on more responsibility.
The leader’s insistence in staying active in management means there is not enough energy being spent on the Visionary Face. More than ever, the business needs its leader to be working on the business regularly, spending time in critical thinking, and painting a clear vision for the future. If the leader insists on staying active in operations and fails to generate a compelling vision that unifies the Leadership Team, the organization may experience retention issues in this key layer of the organization.
Three Faces of a Leader Misalignment
The CEO of a third-party food manufacturing company has successfully led his company to Stage 6. As the original founder, he has always been a strong manager—good at keeping costs low, people happy, and the machines working smoothly. Lately, though, business has begun to stagnate. A large conglomerate has acquired from their customers some of the products they manufacture, including a flagship BBQ sauce that the company has produced for decades. As the company looks to him for direction as to what to do next, he finds that he’s unable to come up with a solution. His impulse is to double down on what he’s good at—overseeing operations—but that no longer seems sufficient.
In talking to his business coach, the CEO can understand that the company needs a compelling vision and more strategic planning to adapt to the changing marketplace and the new demands of the day. Recognizing that he can’t be the person to provide that vision, the CEO decides to hire an outside CEO who has demonstrated strong visionary abilities and to take on the role of President.
This CEO recognizes that despite the success he’s been able to achieve, his inability to create a strong vision for the future is impacting the organization’s health. By hiring a CEO with a track record of being able to provide a vision for a mature organization, he is meeting the company’s needs and giving it an opportunity to keep growing. While other leaders in his position may choose to develop the necessary visionary skills or augment their abilities with a consultant or roach, the key is that the CEO is finding a way for this misalignment not to become a barrier to growth.
The concepts from this article were taken from The Strategic Stage: Organizational ReWilding Rules for Business Growth. Available through The ReWild Group and Amazon, the book explores this and other concepts in-depth while providing illustrations to help business leaders incorporate the ideas into their organizations. Get your copy today to learn the rules for growth for companies with 96-160 employees.