One of the most important lessons in business and leadership for me over the years has been learning how to lead by setting a clear context. When done correctly, context empowers the people you are leading to make the small decisions along the way that are necessary for the team to perform well. The alternative is to lead by control and essentially micromanage every aspect of the task or objective.
Control
Control in the form of authoritative commands and delegating only very small tasks, as opposed to clear objectives. This results in those being led feeling like they have little autonomy in expressing themselves and in their methods to complete the objectives. The other major byproduct of this leadership method is the funnel factor.
Quite frequently when someone operates with or under a very controlling leader they end up subjecting themselves to seeking approval or direction on the smaller mid-task decisions and questions to this controlling leader. This eventually leads to every decision being required to be filtered through this person.
All of this leads to exhaustion on everyone’s part because the leader can only process so much and everyone else ends up waiting on answers from the leader and have difficulty completing anything. It creates an environment of chaos and frustration, especially when the controlling leader has to be out of the office for work or other reasons.
There are some people who actually enjoy working in high control environments because they do not have to exercise critical thought and since they are not making the key decisions they are not responsible for the results of those decisions.
Context
Conversely, leading by context requires taking the time to communicate the objective in as clear a picture as possible with the intent to provide as many of the details around what the objective completed well looks like.
When individuals are led by context they are empowered to take ownership and truly excel in their performance. I should clarify, this creates the opportunity for people to excel in their performance. It still comes down to them really engaging and taking personal initiative and responsibility.
Practically speaking, leading by context requires to fundamental elements.
1) An agreement and understanding between the leader and those being led that, no matter what the pressure, taking the appropriate time to establish context gives everyone the ability to perform well.
2) High Performing people who desire to operate in an environment of freedom and responsibility that requires initiative and personal responsibility from them.
There are a number of benefits to leading by context. Most importantly, attracting top talent to your team is generally one of the most natural byproducts as those people generally prefer to work in environments that give them the freedom for personal expression and individual contributions. Additionally, having a team of rock stars who are allowed to operate with a sense of autonomy within the context of the goal helps the organization or group overcome the complexities they will encounter as they work to their objective.
The Balance
As with most things, there is a balance here and both strategies have an appropriate place in leadership. As a general rule, context makes the most sense in an environment where the objective is custom, unique, or requires a strong element of individuality. For example, web & graphic design, technology research & development, construction, or any organization or objective that requires distributed leadership and decision making.
Context applies best in very process driven organizations or objectives where results are a matter of life and safety or otherwise very critical to maintain consistency. Examples of control would include fast food, military, or in training new construction workers.
The bottom line is; there is no perfect answer to context vs control. Both methods have their place. It comes down to using your best discretion and experience to determine which method or which combination of these methods makes the most sense for you.
-JS