Be a Versatile Boss By Adapting Your Leadership Style

A weekly newsletter featuring the biggest ideas from the smartest people

I suppose if you’re going to be taking advice on how to be a leader, it may as well come from a guy named Boss. Forbes contributor Jeff Boss has a really insightful article up on that site all about the differences between expectations when you’re a general employee versus when you’re promoted to a leadership position. The key takeaway is that general employees are evaluated on their functional expertise. They’re the best salespersons or the most capable innovators or, simply, the most productive at whatever it is they do. The metrics of evaluation tend to be visible and clear.

Everything changes once that employee gets promoted to leadership:

“Instead, [the employee] is now measured on [their] character and how well he navigates relationships to work and achieve results collaboratively. [Their] success now depends less on functional expertise and more on general knowledge.”

Boss writes that a new skillset must emerge: the ability to adapt. In order to allow your versatility to blossom, he recommends a four-step approach: detect, adapt, choose, and adopt. In short, the name of the game becomes tactical awareness. You should have a bevy of different styles and approaches stocked up in your leadership arsenal. Identifying where and when to use them is vital to lasting success.