The Decaying Orbit

My last post suggested that careers follow a natural curve of maturity, decline, and renewal rather than follow a linearly progressive curve, which is the more common conceit. The linear growth progression is an artificial construct we superimpose on the natural rhythms of human development.

Closely tied to this is an idea that as a person navigates his or her progression up the career ladder, management skills become increasingly important. This is of a piece with the idea of linear progression: the higher up you go, the more time a person spends controlling and directing others, and increasingly less time is spent making an individual contribution. I disagree on both counts.

Consider an individual's growth as a human being, starting from the first days in the cradle. We all start life completely focused on the self. An infant only focuses on objects outside himself so that he can meet his own basic needs: influencing a care giver to feed him, keep him comfortable, touch and hold him. With time, he differentiates between the people most important to him (the people who meet his needs daily) and everyone else. He strives to control the environment around him, primarily by influencing those people who can help him control it. By school-age, the individual is learning self-control, and how to influence people outside his family so that he can control his environment. Eventually, the individual expands his world to care about those he does not know personally. Over time, the individual's world expands outward by degrees, and in this process affects his relationship and responsibility to the world in concentric circles around him. Graphically, it looks something like this:


But imagine if you will that each of these circles is actually a 3-dimensional sphere comprising a world relative to the individual, who is the point at the center of it all. Of course, each sphere or world can exist without that individual; this is simply the view from the individual, looking out beyond himself. Only the world of self is entirely dependent on that individual.

A person can manage himself, because that world begins and ends with him. He and only he can direct and control his actions. Although we like to think we can manage others, we can really only influence them; they control their muscles and thoughts, ultimately. Although parents are advised to control or manage their children, in reality parenting consists of setting limits to keep a child within the sphere in which the child can control herself. That's what a time out is all about: remove the child from the sphere where she is acting out, returning her to the sphere of her self so that she is able to regain control of herself. As the child matures, the time out evolves into being grounded. These are similar methods to assist a child to learn self-management, which is essential for becoming socialized.

Self-management is also important in the workplace. It becomes less significant as responsibilities increase, but only because the individual must be highly competent in self-management in order to gain additional responsibilities. As a person is promoted to a position in which she is responsible for the work of others, we call that person a manager. However, the most important role that person plays is to influence others, less than to manage them (if manage means control and direct). Someone who has hundreds or thousands of employees underneath him on an organizational chart can't be said to manage that many people. I can only be puzzled by resumes that claim "250 direct reports" -- just what does that mean? But even with a smaller number of direct reports: what does it mean to 'manage' them? If manage means to control and direct their actions: how is this possible?

I recall a discussion with an employee a number of years ago. He was a senior manager who led a technology team, and I knew he was unhappy. I sought the meeting to learn what was amiss. I explained to him that his success was important to me, and asked how I could be a better support for him. After a bit of talking around it, he finally blurted out, "What kind of manager are you? You aren't managing me!" Whatever I expected to hear, that was not it. This was a professional whose job description gave him significant latitude in directing his team and creating their product line. I had assumed he enjoyed that latitude. Although he didn't want me to boss him around, he was put off by my not even attempting to. We finally agreed upon some structural changes in our relationship, but I couldn't agree to do what only he could do: manage himself. I did learn, however, that the influencing skills that were working well with others in the division were less effective in working with him. I had stepped into a sphere I hadn't understood, and stumbled because I didn't recognize the difference. I had to become a novice again, with this employee, to gain a firmer footing so that I could support his success.

Influence is not a single skill or set of skills. It is less about you, and more about the sphere you are trying to influence. As one's career progresses, the spheres you encounter change in size and in kind. They change with the culture of the population within the sphere -- both the corporate culture and the varied cultures employees bring to their jobs. The sphere is impacted by changes in markets and economies. Therefore, you can never feel that you have finally achieved the skill of influence; this learning is continual.

As one's career progresses and an individual is increasingly more responsible for company outcomes, a couple of things happen. Influence becomes significantly more important, if only because the populations to be influenced become more varied and disparate. At the same time, one has an increasing opportunity to influence in an individualistic way. Although we talk about individual contributors as either professionals or non-management employees, no one is more an individual contributor than the top executive of an organization. That person has a unique opportunity to shape the culture, relationships, and outcomes for employees and customers so that they are entirely aligned with his or her personal vision. Paradoxically, as an individual's influence increases, that influence is both more personal and more outward-focused. Learning how to balance both ends of this paradox is extremely difficult: too much of one or the other can result in executives who are, in the extremes, either self-absorbed bullies or hollow shills.

So, if we superimpose these two concepts together, what do we have?




Each ring of the concentric circles indicates a new sphere of influence. It can be a different population -- assuming leadership of a new group, for instance -- but it can also be a population that has changed. Leading a company in the midst of a great recession is different from leading during a boom period, for instance. With time comes change, and although some behaviors will continue to be successful, others will not. It is at this point that the maturity of your skill set will start to show its limitations, and if you anticipate the cycle, you can start to understand what the spheres you have entered into require of you that was different. Your orbit is decaying; you will need to re-launch.

This is, I think, a more naturalistic perspective on career development. As a metaphor, it more closely reflects the human dynamics of learning and leading than do the popular notions of management and career progression. Most importantly, it is inclusive rather than exclusive: it suggests but does not proscribe. It is a metaphor of possibility that embraces failure because it enables learning and innovation. It is forgiving (don't expect yourself to be perfect all the time) and yet it is demanding (don't rest on your laurels...).

In my next post, I will move from the theoretical to the practical: so what does this look like in real life, and how could it make a difference?