CHAPTER NINE
Inspirer Power Plays
Inspirers are the rugged individuals of corporate America, the pioneering thinkers in academia, and the visionary artists who create the symbols that embody our cultural experience.
Although they are motivated to do what’s best for the group, Inspirers are such independent thinkers that they often don’t view challenges through the lens of the “group mind.” While the tendency to think outside the box boosts the creative potential of many Inspirers, it makes implementation a struggle for them. Until they embrace the pros and cons of working within an organization in an evenhanded way, Inspirers can find themselves floundering when it comes to any type of management: managing up, managing down, managing across, or even managing themselves.
The paradox of wanting to help a group that’s often lagging behind them conceptually is both the root of the Inspirer’s talent and the source of their potential demise. To realize the full scope of their creative abilities, Inspirers need to learn how to leverage the structures they work in rather than rejecting the limitations of a particular system prematurely. Inspirers also need to appreciate that the personal agendas of people who operate from other quadrants can present more than an impediment to progress. Resistance from people who see the world differently from them can offer the Inspirer clues to the tactical dimensions of a challenge that they may not have considered previously.
When the Inspirer Is the Boss
The Inspirer has come from a family system where they were encouraged to candidly express their full range of thoughts and feelings to authority figures. However, it takes more than innovative thinking to run a successful business. It’s critical for Inspirers in senior management to be surrounded by people from other quadrants who will balance their sense of vision with the practicality necessary to keep the firm commercially viable.
Inspirers don’t care what your title is; they care about what you can do to help the organization. Thus, the underlying tone established by Inspirers is one where it feels as if they are always dealing with peers—even when the Inspirer is the boss. As warm and collaborative as this can be, it presents a problem when someone needs to be held accountable for the detail work. Inspirers should bear in mind that if they don’t sometimes “subordinate their subordinates,” they won’t have anyone looking after the details that keep an organization running smoothly.
Successful Inspirers often find it helpful to surround themselves with Pleasers who have an eye for the administrative and tactical details that they tend to miss. Still, once they have identified and hired some talented Pleasers for their team, the Inspirer must resist the temptation to turn staff meetings into brainstorming sessions. If they don’t let their subordinates play their designated role, something may fall between the cracks.
Keep an Eye on the Politics Brewing Beneath You
There’s an argument to be made that a boss who isn’t managing the politics within his or her department isn’t managing at all. Some Inspirers, particularly those in large organizations, are naively oblivious to the fact that they have subordinates who will resort to things that they wouldn’t dream of to further a personal agenda. The Inspirer who wants to run an effective team can’t have his or her head in the clouds when it comes to monitoring the personal dynamics between staff members. For a department to run effectively, the staff must know that power struggles and turf wars will be resolved in a professional and straightforward manner and won’t degenerate into informal popularity contests. While many Inspirers would rather fly safely above the fray when tension is brewing in the ranks, a good manager can’t afford to ignore these squabbles. The boss must have his or her finger on the pulse of what’s happening between key staff members to be prepared to coach them through the rough spots so they can work together effectively.
Get Feedback from Outside Your Fan Club
Inspirers are so likeable that colleagues may avoid telling them the hard truths they need to hear. When it comes to Inspirers in senior management, the hard truth often has something to do with ways that their visionary zeal is causing them to miss commercial opportunities. What’s more, it’s often the Inspirer’s staff that gets wind that something’s wrong in Camelot long before it dawns on the Inspirer boss. Because of this, Inspirers need to keep company with people who haven’t been fans of their work. While the Inspirer often has to coax colleagues and staff members to share negative feedback, it’s worth it. Even if a complaint is coming from someone who has an ax to grind, and their perspective is distorted, this will still help the Inspirer understand how their efforts may be perceived by people who don’t share their vision.
Create Incentives for Innovation
Hiring other types on the grid is one thing, but managing them so that you get what you need most from them is quite another. To do this, Inspirers have to be sure that their system is structured to reward subordinates for creative thinking and for speaking up. If an Inspirer boss doesn’t take the time to reward creativity, key team members are likely to stay within their own comfort zone until they see the payoff for intellectual elbow grease. Inspirer bosses frequently overlook this simple point because no one ever had to incentivize them to innovate—they do this naturally.
Inspirers should let their direct reports know point blank that they want to hear their ideas and that they will be rewarded for innovative thinking. This can require a sustained effort because some subordinates, Commanders in particular, can be so eager to act that getting them to reflect on what they are doing and why they are doing it can be challenging. Remember, Commanders aren’t conditioned to ask questions; they are conditioned to execute orders.
Create Structures as Incentives
Formalizing incentive programs and enforcing consequences can seem foreign to the Inspirer whose family system prized freedom of expression so much that they learned to avoid structure for fear of stifling creativity. But the Inspirer’s direct reports may need explicit direction in order to fulfill their potential. Putting thoughtful performance evaluation, compensation, and succession-planning structures in place can help establish the needed goals and guidelines for subordinates. It will also help the Inspirer’s boss see that his or her feet are solidly on the ground in terms of meeting the challenges of managing a diverse team.
Power Grid Case Study: The Inspirer Managing a Commander
Christopher is an art gallery owner and an Inspirer. His father was a founding partner of one of the world’s best-known advertising agencies. His mother, a former model, was an active philanthropist. Both of his parents were passionate about politics. Because of the ongoing fund-raisers held in his home, Christopher grew up surrounded by many of America’s most prominent business leaders, artists, and politicians. Like many Inspirers, Christopher developed the desire to make a lasting mark on American culture.
As we learned in chapter 7, Christopher recently hired Melinda (a self-identified Commander) to make some strategic purchases for his gallery during the market downturn. When Melinda agreed to work for Christopher, he was elated. He had dedicated much of his career to supporting new artists, and Melinda’s previous job as a corporate curator had empowered her to purchase the work of rising stars they had both admired.
However, once Melinda became his direct report, Christopher couldn’t hide his disappointment when she began dodging his direct questions about how she “felt” about a piece of art by hiding behind a spreadsheet analysis of its market value. One day, Christopher simply couldn’t hide his frustration when Melinda started spouting numbers at him. “Damn it, Melinda!” he exploded. “This collection is as much a personal mission for me as it is a business. Could you try to reference something a little deeper than money once in a while!”
By the look on her face, Christopher could see that Melinda was stricken. An inevitable mismatch of performance expectations takes place when an Inspirer manages down to a Commander. The heart of this mismatch comes from how they each learned to operate around authority figures. The Inspirer, who pays little attention to hierarchy, longs for the type of sounding board one finds in a trusted peer. In contrast, the Commander has been conditioned to follow instructions and question authority as little as possible.
For an Inspirer like Christopher to get what he needed from this important hire, he was going to have the take the time necessary to clarify his expectations in terms of how they approached the process of selecting art. Commanders will do whatever it takes to please the boss, but they aren’t mind readers. As they worked together to establish an evaluation process they could both understand, Melinda began to meet and in some cases exceed his expectations.
If Inspirers want a Commander to stop operating on automatic pilot and bring more originality to work, they are going to have to incorporate some type of structure that consistently reminds the Commander that fresh thinking is a performance requirement. To convince any type of employee that they are serious about making innovative thinking part of their required job description, Inspirers need to create financial incentives tied to their subordinates’ creative efforts.
The Inspirer as a Peer
Peer relationships come so naturally to Inspirers that they tend to treat everyone they work with as equals. As we have seen, one inherent danger here is that as they rise within the hierarchy of their system, Inspirers’ tendencies to dismiss the importance of rank can make them a political target for Charmers and Commanders. Before Inspirers have worked through their blind spots, some Charmers and Commanders may try to position themselves as senior to the Inspirer. Inspirers must remember that when jostling with peers for the next top spot, the less self-aware Charmers and Commanders may be tempted to elbow anyone aside who looks like an easy target.
My work with Inspirers has taught me that noble intentions, widespread popularity, and even celebrity can’t fully protect an Inspirer from competitive peers within his or her system. Inspirers who hope to maintain a sustainable power base must remain mindful of the personal agendas driving their peers.
Identify Jealous Colleagues and Share the Spotlight
Inspirers have to remember that their natural charisma and the attention it attracts may spark a backlash from insecure colleagues. A jealous colleague can become a dangerous colleague. Feeling eclipsed by an Inspirer can bring out the dark side of envious peers. On the job, this dark side often drives the green-eyed peer to places where they feel they can express their hostility anonymously. This can be the office grapevine, where they may drop complaints and unfavorable comments. Granted, this is the reputational equivalent of road rage. In a perfect world we’d all ignore it. Unfortunately, it’s not a perfect world, and it can still hurt the unaware Inspirer.
How can you, as an Inspirer, insulate yourself from stealth attacks by envious peers? Remember to share the spotlight with your colleagues whenever possible. Also, be sure you take the time to carefully consider the contribution your peers are making and to run this up the flagpole to senior management when appropriate. The best defense against being stabbed in the back is to be known far and wide as an enthusiastic advocate of others. To the extent that you remember to do this, you are less likely to become a target when your popularity is on the rise.
Don’t Lose Sight of Commercial Practicalities
Make sure your peers understand how your thought process can benefit them commercially. Don’t think that they will give you the benefit of the doubt on this. Many types on the grid may need you to connect the dots on this for them because they don’t share your priorities. For example, if one of your peers is a Charmer and they don’t see how your ideas will benefit their bottom line, they may secretly find a way to manage you out if they think you are in their way.
In many business situations, the administrative details that Inspirers tend to gloss over can be at the heart of the commercial point. Because of their tendency to overlook details, Inspirers will often innocently allow peers to take control of the administrative aspects of projects while they ponder the big picture. I’ve seen this misstep undermine the power base of some talented Inspirers. It’s not uncommon for the Inspirer’s colleagues to use their knowledge and control of administrative details to maneuver themselves ahead of the Inspirer and grab credit for any success associated with a key project.
Accept That Some People Refuse to Think Outside the Box
Some people are determined to do things the way they’ve always been done, for a variety of reasons. They don’t want to think that hard; the status quo is profitable for them personally; they are risk averse—the list goes on and on. For example, when the Inspirer is managing across to a Commander, they are dealing with a peer who usually doesn’t like to think outside the box, because many Commanders don’t see taking the time to brainstorm as practical. Commanders are action oriented. Since many Commanders aren’t comfortable unless they are in perpetual motion, pausing to think through complex issues can be emotionally agonizing for them. To work productively with peers from other quadrants on the grid, the Inspirer must always bear in mind that their peers see the world differently and have other priorities.
Don’t Spend Too Much Time with the Cheerleaders
Even when peers agree with you wholeheartedly, it’s still not always smooth sailing. Enjoy a supportive sounding board, but make sure you and the peers who naturally share your vision don’t lose sight of commercial realities. While sharing a sense of vision with peers may give you an energy boost, you both may need a reality check from other quadrants in order to bring you back down to earth. If not, both of you risk getting carried away with your ideas of how things should work and missing crucial details in terms of how to do the work in the current environment.
Power Grid Case Study: An Inspirer and His Pleaser Peer
Paul is an Inspirer, and Dave is a Pleaser. These two manage across to one another as directors in the information technology division of a large investment bank. They both report to a new boss, another Inspirer, named Jeff.
When Paul was growing up as an Inspirer, one of the unspoken rules from his childhood was that talent and professional advancement always took a back seat to maintaining solid relationships with close family and friends. Paul recalls numerous family functions from his childhood where his parents entertained a mix of people ranging from celebrated academics to out-of-work musicians. By the end of the evening, they were all singing together under the stars around the fire pit—regardless of age or social standing.
Like many Inspirers, Paul grew up less interested in where someone fell in the hierarchy of any organization than in what that individual could contribute to helping the system advance. His easygoing manner always made Paul’s superiors feel free to crack jokes and speak their mind around him without worrying that Paul would become preoccupied with how their relationship might boost his career.
A chance encounter at a local coffee bar sparked an informal friendship between Paul and the group’s new boss, Jeff. As they were both Inspirers, Jeff responded positively to Paul’s creative thought process and soon began dropping by Paul’s office on a regular basis.
While Paul wasn’t counting how many times Jeff stopped by, Paul’s colleague Dave was practically charting these visits. The fact that the boss kept spending time with Paul and not bonding with him was driving Dave crazy. Behind Paul’s back, Dave began insinuating that Paul might be undermining others to position himself with the boss.
What the Inspirer has to bear in mind is that a jealous Pleaser can hurt their professional reputation. If they don’t get the attention they want in a constructive way, Pleasers will often manufacture a way to get the attention by less-than-legitimate means. Dave started dealing with his frustration by complaining through the office grapevine.
There are a few truths in life you can almost always count on. The sun will rise tomorrow, the law of gravity will hold, and when you start gossiping about people, they will eventually find out.
When Paul realized how and why he had become the brunt of office gossip, it seemed unbelievable to him that Dave would care so much about a few casual encounters with the boss. However, once he grasped that Dave was so preoccupied with the matter, Paul was smart enough to take action promptly to ease the situation.
The next time Jeff stepped into Paul’s office, Paul made a point of inviting Dave into the conversation. Paul also began sending e-mails to Jeff and to his other colleagues to compliment people who did good work. Paul did this to leverage the power of grapevine chatter to restore his reputation as a supportive and trustworthy colleague.
The main thing to bear in mind when you are an Inspirer managing across to a Pleaser is that he or she is going to notice many political signals that you miss. While the Inspirer is focused on big-picture issues, the Pleaser is hardwired to spot the nuances of who appears to be most popular with senior managers. If you sense jealousy or discord among your colleagues, don’t sweep it under the rug. Take control of the group dynamic promptly and positively.
When the Inspirer Is a Subordinate
As we have seen, when an Inspirer is focused on what they consider to be a worthy cause, they can tend to overlook some important details. One of the main things they miss, which is often a career killer, is that their boss may not share their priorities.
For many Inspirers, the caregivers in their family systems conditioned them to trust that authority figures will be genuinely interested in their ideas. This assumption can be overly optimistic when their boss is operating from another quadrant.
Watch for Clues That Your Boss Is Tuning You Out
Bear in mind that some superiors don’t particularly care what you think or how you feel unless you outrank them. This is particularly true when the boss is a Commander. While the Inspirer might legitimately think his or her insights should be important to the boss, the Commander often doesn’t care what people below them in the hierarchy think about anything. Remember, the Commander isn’t really in love with the idea of brainstorming anyway. They’d much rather be storming the next hill. If they are going to force themselves to stop rushing around long enough to converse with anyone, odds are that they are only going to make this effort for someone who outranks them. However, it’s not just Commanders who start glancing at their watches impatiently when the enthusiastic Inspirer gets wound up. Don’t forget that your boss may have deadlines and priorities you know nothing about. Stay alert for body language, and exit gracefully when you are losing the attention of your boss.
Realize That Original Thinking Can Prompt an Organizational Backlash
If you work in a large firm where your boss isn’t the CEO or founder, bear in mind that original thinking is not always met with appreciation. Whenever there’s room for improvement in any organization, if the place is big enough, you can bet that somebody’s siphoning power off for themselves at precisely the spot where things are breaking down. Because of their seniority, your boss may be able to assess the potential resistance to a new idea better than you can. Thus, regardless of how rational your argument for any improvement may be, brace yourself for the power plays you, and by extension your boss, may encounter if you end up stepping on someone else’s turf—even when you are tiptoeing around for the greater good.
Be Careful Not to Upstage Your Boss!
Your boss may not telegraph how enraged he or she gets when someone yanks the spotlight away from them, but upstaging the boss is a risk that’s just not worth taking. Your best bet is to share your most innovative ideas with your superior in such a way that they feel it will be to their advantage to share the credit with you. If you end up reporting to someone who establishes a pattern of grabbing credit for your work, then you may need to try to reposition your career so you can report to someone with more intellectual integrity. That said, rarely is any one idea worth potentially sabotaging your relationship with your superior. Inspirers who outshine their superiors at the wrong moment have received everything from mysteriously negative performance reviews to pink slips.
Don’t Leave Prematurely—or Abruptly
One of the biggest challenges presents itself when the Inspirer decides that his or her boss is exhibiting behavior that clashes with the Inspirer’s ethical code. This is because most Inspirers can’t work for someone they don’t respect for a protracted period of time. Many Inspirers have told me that having a boss who is focused on his or her personal advantage at the expense of the organization is something they can’t tolerate for long. The Inspirer often feels compelled to get away from this type of boss because the emotional strain of trying to make sense of out of what the Inspirer perceives to be toxic behavior feels overwhelming. When this is the case, the Inspirer needs to remember that how they leave an organization is often as important as what they have accomplished there when it comes to their ongoing reputation. Regardless of how you feel about your boss, take the time to lay your transitional groundwork carefully. Remember, some bosses rarely think they have done anything wrong, because in their minds, it’s always somebody else’s fault. Thus, if you leave them in the lurch, they may find some creative ways to punish you.
Power Grid Case Study
Toni, a single mother of Native American descent, is an Inspirer who keeps the books and does most of the general management for a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping women below the poverty line get the job skills they need to support their families. Bonnie is a Charmer who has recently left a high-profile job in the private sector to run this nonprofit. We met both of these women in chapter 5, when we explored the scenario from the perspective of the Charmer.
Toni was initially thrilled that Bonnie was going to be her boss. Bonnie looked like the type of confident career woman Toni had always admired.
Unfortunately, as time passed, Toni’s admiration for Bonnie began to deteriorate. As an Inspirer, Toni valued using the resources of the organization to benefit the greater good and focused on helping the agency operate frugally. Toni’s first red flag came when she started going over the bank statement and thought that the agency had been double charged for their monthly utilities. To her horror, Toni discovered that the huge extra debit was money Bonnie had withdrawn to take a popular journalist out to lunch! Until that day, Toni didn’t even know it was possible to spend that much money on a single meal.
Raised to believe that people in authority would be interested in her concerns, Toni decided to discuss the budget dilemma with Bonnie. In many ways, this was a strong professional response. By dealing with a Charmer boss directly and diplomatically, Inspirers are often able to maintain their relationship with the boss and sustain their self-respect as the inevitable clash of values between these two types runs its course. In fact, in some situations, by not confronting a Charmer boss, the Inspirer may run the risk of coming across as a doormat.
While Bonnie was reassuring, Toni got the uncomfortable feeling that she was being “handled” rather than heard. A couple of weeks later, Toni discovered that one of Bonnie’s lavish lunches had wiped out the funds the agency had earmarked to host a party to benefit unwed mothers. Toni responded by leaving Bonnie a polite letter of resignation.
Inspirers can’t keep working for a boss whose values they don’t respect. When they share their opinions with the boss, the Inspirer has to be careful not to become overly hopeful that such conversations will lead to behavioral change. The bottom line with these two is that since the Inspirer is focused on what benefits the system while Charmers are focused on what furthers their personal agenda, the clash of values between them takes place on so many levels that it’s often only a matter of time before the Inspirer leaves.
As with many Inspirers, once Toni lost respect for her boss, she began to check out mentally before she actually resigned. Regardless of her personal feelings about Bonnie, Toni stopped operating by her own highest values when she stopped striving to find a way to communicate her convictions about what was best for the organization. Inspirers must remember that how and why they leave an organization is often as important to their professional reputations as the hard work they have done during their active tenure. Obviously, tactfully lining up an alternative job opportunity is important for the Inspirer’s career momentum. However, it’s equally important for the Inspirer to use such transitional moments as an opportunity to clearly voice their professional concerns for the sake of the remaining employees and clients of the organizations that have employed them.
Conclusion
While Inspirers’ motives often have heroic undertones, the blind spot most Inspirers struggle with involves becoming so fixated on their vision of how things could be that they overlook details vital to grappling with circumstances as they are.
While some types on the grid have to work to tune in to their inner voice, the Inspirer’s challenge is often the reverse. The volume on the Inspirer’s “voice from within” is often so loud that it drowns out the potentially helpful input that colleagues from other types on the Power Grid can share with them.
Applying their creativity to the here and now starts to happen naturally once the Inspirer begins to embrace the resources in their business structure. By developing a more balanced power style, the Inspirer learns how to work with office politics rather than being worked over by them. They learn how to command the respect of their peers rather than becoming targets of envy. They also learn how to evolve from being well-intentioned mentors into being strong managers.
The more the Inspirer practices these skills, the better they get at maneuvering around restrictions rather than hanging up their jersey and leaving the field when they hit a bureaucratic hurdle. This, as we know, is the birth of political savvy.