Be Careful Not to Punish Competence

You wouldn’t normally think that being highly effective or competent at core tasks would be a bad thing. But leaders are people, too. They want to go with their best-skilled players. All the time.

So when a leader decides that every key assignment needs the attention of a particular team member, they exact an increasingly heavy burden. 

Leaders naturally want their highest talent on the most important projects and tasks. But they sometimes go to the well too often. They turn to the same people again and again to get things done precisely because of how good they are. By leaning so heavily on the same team members, they unintentionally punish them for being highly competent. 

Team members who get asked to apply their talents on a disproportionately high number of assignments begin to recognize a pattern they have likely experienced earlier in life. The better they are, the more they get asked to do. 

At first, this can seem like high recognition. But the continual requests and work soon become overwhelming, potentially creating sourness and burnout. 

The rest of the team often feels slighted or delighted, depending on who they are and how they see the value of their own contributions. The imbalance this creates then becomes a growing problem, leading to jealousy or laziness from others. 

Leaders are often unaware of the impact their choices have on the team and the go-to players. Or they are all too aware but ignore the issue because of the need to deliver great outcomes. 

The best leaders guard against this problem and are purposeful in spreading work and assignments more evenly around the team. They accept that not every project can benefit from the same one or two team members. 

They coach up others and create more expertise on the team through experience and opportunities for everyone. They stay attuned to their best talent, making sure they are not asking too much from them. 

Losing high talent because they are overworked and overtasked is never a winning strategy. The best leaders are careful not to punish competence. Stretching people is what effective leadership is all about, but not to the breaking point. People who break don't do any work.