Challenge #3
THE MULTI-HAT CHALLENGE:
One Head . . . Many Hats
THE KEY TO SUCCESSFULLY NAVIGATING THE MULTI-HAT CHALLENGE:
Knowing what hat to put on and then enjoying the challenge.
I held my first leadership position in 1969, but it wasn’t until 1974 that I hired my first employee, Stan Toler. I was delighted to have someone working with me, because I realized that I could not do my job alone. I hired Stan as my assistant pastor. That probably sounds simple enough, but if you were to talk to Stan, his side of the story would be a little different. I’ve heard him describe that job as choir director, youth pastor, senior-adult pastor, Sunday school director, Vacation Bible School director, bus-ministry pastor, custodian, and general gofer (including picking up my dry cleaning and gassing up my Ford Pinto). If ever there was a leader in the middle who had to deal with the Multi-Hat Challenge, it was Stan!
THE PRESSURE OF WEARING MANY HATS
The predicament Stan faced isn’t unusual for most leaders in the middle of an organization. While it’s true that people at every level of an organization have strong demands placed on them, leaders in the middle who desire to practice 360-Degree Leadership experience pressures that others don’t. Here’s what I mean:
PEOPLE AT THE BOTTOM OF AN ORGANIZATION
When people are first starting out at the bottom of an organization, they usually perform a limited number of tasks that are assigned to them. Those tasks may be challenging. They may be physically or mentally demanding. They may require great skill. But most of the time, they require only one “hat.” For example, thanks to Henry Ford, people on the production line were given one task to do, and they performed it over and over, though some companies now try to give workers some relief from endless repetition.
Cooks working on the line in a restaurant, such as the grill station, have a very narrow set of responsibilities: they get their stations ready before service, they grill food to order during service, and they clean their stations when they’re done. Theirs are not jobs everyone can do—they require speed, skill, and stamina. But working a station on the line requires one set of skills. Likewise, representatives in a call center do one main thing—they talk to customers and either sell products, make appointments, or solve problems. Once again, it’s not something everyone can excel at, but it is a responsibility that is very focused.
People who know their jobs and perform them well can become world-class practitioners of their craft. They can be content in their work and achieve success. But if they can do only one thing—or are willing to do only one thing—they will probably not “move up” as leaders. Leadership requires the ability to do many things well. To use a sports analogy, it’s less like trying to win a single race and more like trying to compete in the decathlon.
PEOPLE AT THE TOP OF AN ORGANIZATION
Leaders at the top of an organization have their own sets of challenges. For example, they feel the weight of success or failure for the entire organization—no doubt about it. But they also have a luxury that leaders in the middle don’t—they can choose what to do. They can determine their priorities, focus on their strengths, and direct their time and energy to only those things that give the organization the greatest return. Anything else they can either delegate or dismiss.
It’s ironic that to become leaders, people must be able to do many things well, but in order to become leaders at the top, they must do fewer things with great excellence. In fact, successful leaders figure this out as they move from the middle to the top of an organization. I’ve never met a successful CEO yet who isn’t focused and who doesn’t limit himself to the one, two, or three things he does best.
PEOPLE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ORGANIZATION
Leaders in the middle, on the other hand, usually experience the Multi-Hat Challenge on a daily basis. They must perform tasks and have knowledge beyond their personal experience. And they often are forced to deal with multiple shifting priorities, often with limited time and resources. My friend Douglas Randlett calls this the “handyman syndrome.”
Leaders in the middle usually experience the Multi-Hat Challenge on a daily basis.
The following diagram illustrates the dynamic that most leaders in the middle of an organization have to deal with:
Take, for example, a grill cook who decides to move up and become a sous-chef (the person who usually runs the kitchen in a restaurant). When he was a cook, he had to please only one person, the sous-chef, and he took orders only from him or her. But when he becomes the sous-chef, his world changes because he is now the person who runs the kitchen day-to-day. As the sous-chef, there are specific things he must do during service. As each order comes into the kitchen, he must tell the cooks at every station what to cook. It’s his job to coordinate all of the various cooks’ efforts so that the food they are cooking on the different stations is ready at the same time for a table’s order. He is also responsible for interacting with the waiters, helping them satisfy the customers, and solving their problems. When the waiters are under pressure and feeling the demands of the customers, the sous-chef feels it.
But those aren’t the only pressures the sous-chef experiences. Every cook in the kitchen is looking to him for leadership. During service, he determines how the kitchen is run and sets the standard for how the food is prepared. He also schedules their work, makes sure they get paid, and mediates the disputes that always occur.
When he’s not actually on the line during service, the sous-chef also has the responsibility of ordering food and supplies from vendors. His priorities are quality and price, but each vendor has expectations of him. They want his business and his time.
Of course, the sous-chef is also accountable to the chef de cuisine or the owner of the restaurant, who wants a business that is well run and profitable. When he was a cook working at the grill station, he wore only one hat. He was insulated from the customers. He rarely had to interact with the owner. He didn’t have to work with vendors. And he had no staff to lead. Life was much simpler as a cook. In fact, dealing with the Multi-Hat Challenge is one of the things that keep people from moving up in an organization. Many workers decide they would rather not have all the headaches of leadership and stay where they are, doing just a few things and not wearing a lot of hats.
HOW TO HANDLE THE MULTI-HAT CHALLENGE
Billy Hornsby, cofounder of ARC and director for EQUIP’s European leadership development initiative, said that being in the middle of an organization is like being the middle child in a family. These leaders have to learn to get along with everybody around them and survive the various “family” dynamics—following, leading, cajoling, appeasing, and partnering as needed. It’s not an easy task.
“Being in the middle of an organization is like being the middle child in a family.”
—BILLY HORNSBY
So what are leaders in the middle of an organization to do when they are required to wear many hats but have only one head? Here are my suggestions:
1. REMEMBER THAT THE HAT SETS THE CONTEXT WHEN INTERACTING WITH OTHERS
Every role or “hat” you are asked to wear has its own responsibilities and objectives. If you change hats, keep in mind that the context changes. You wouldn’t interact in the same way with your spouse, your children, your boss, and your employees, would you? The goal often determines the role and the approach to take.
2. DON’T USE ONE HAT TO ACCOMPLISH A TASK REQUIRED FOR ANOTHER HAT
In her capacity as my assistant, Linda Eggers constantly attends meetings of my organization’s top leaders when I am traveling. She does that so that she can keep me up to date on strategy and important changes that are occurring. When she is working in that capacity, Linda never abuses her “communication link” hat to get her own way, nor does she put on her “speaking for John” hat to preemptively stop leaders from taking action by saying something like, “John wouldn’t want that.” She is very cognizant that her words carry great weight.
Likewise, after Linda attends those types of meetings and she fills me in on what happened, she is also careful to represent the people in the meeting fairly and accurately. She will give her opinions, but she works not to “color” what has been said or done.
Linda, like many assistants, wears many hats. She has become an expert at knowing what hat to wear in any given situation, and she can change hats in an instant. She has a very powerful position, but she never uses one hat to accomplish tasks that may be required of her in another capacity. She takes the time to cultivate each working relationship on its own terms, and acts accordingly. It’s often a balancing act, but it’s one she does exceptionally well.
3. WHEN YOU CHANGE HATS, DON’T CHANGE YOUR PERSONALITY
I mentioned that you shouldn’t treat your spouse the same way you treat your employees. That’s just common sense. That doesn’t mean, however, that you should change your personality according to who you’re with. Your attitude and behavior should be consistent and predictable with everyone. Otherwise, you won’t be trustworthy in the eyes of anyone you work with.
4. DON’T NEGLECT ANY HAT YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE TO WEAR
Before Rod Loy became a top leader, he served as an executive in a large organization. For six months during a leadership shortage, he also functioned as the interim leader of two different additional departments. To make sure he didn’t drop any balls, he literally set up three offices. He would spend five hours a day in the executive office and work on only those responsibilities there. He would then go to one of the other department’s office for two hours to do those duties, and finally to the third office for two hours to perform those duties.
Why did he do that? He discovered that if he neglected the duties of any hat for a day, he fell behind. The physical separation of the three offices helped him make the mental jump needed to keep all his responsibilities moving forward. You may not need or want to go to such lengths. However, if you are being asked to wear many hats by people in your organization, then you must be sure not to neglect any one of them.
5. REMAIN FLEXIBLE
The key to taking on the Multi-Hat Challenge is knowing what hat to put on at any time and enjoying the challenge it offers. How does one do that? The secret is to remain flexible. Because there are so many demands on leaders in the middle of an organization, they can’t afford to be rigid; they need to be able to turn on a dime or change hats at a moment’s notice.
Some people love a new challenge and thrive on the rapidly changing demands and nature of leadership in the middle of an organization. It energizes them. Others find it less appealing. But it’s something all 360-Degree Leaders must learn to navigate if they want to be successful and influence others from wherever they are in the organization.
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