Their time is spent coaching, removing obstacles, and providing resources to ensure that all of their people can succeed. As a result, they don’t look like they’re actually doing anything themselves. And that is because they are driving through others, not through themselves.

An essential part of leadership is being willing to have the difficult conversations, manage and mediate conflict, and handle the really hard things on the team so that your people don’t have to do your job.

As a leader, it is your job to create the conditions for success. So pay attention to what success looks like for each of your people and what they need to attain it.

It is important that you understand each of their unique needs and then flex your leadership style to meet them where they are, rather than expecting them to flex their style always to you.

It is not about you when you’re a leader. It is about your team. So shift from this mindset of leadership as a reward for you to leadership as a responsibility to your people.

Instead, treat them like you might treat yourself. Think about what might have happened to prevent them from showing up as their best selves. What resources did they need? What might have made it more difficult for them to succeed and how can you make sure they have what they need to be successful?

Your mind is naturally going to go toward this fundamental attribution error and decide that, ah they weren’t working hard enough, they didn’t try hard enough, they were lazy, they didn’t know what they’re doing, they’re not good enough.

What this means is we give ourself grace and we struggle to give other people grace. As a leader, your people are not always going to stick the landing. Sometimes they’re really going to struggle.

And when you hit those times, you must never take away somebody else's dignity. No matter what they've done, no matter what's going on, they are still a human being and deserve all of the dignity that comes with that.

That piece has been one of the key pillars that I have brought with me in my career. There are going to be times when you have to discipline somebody, when you have to have difficult conversations, when you have to make difficult decisions when it comes to your people.

I asked one of my mentors at the time, does it ever get easier? He said no. He said, no, it doesn't get easier. But I'll tell you what you do need to do. No matter what somebody's done, no matter what kind of discipline that you have to enact as a leader, never take away somebody's dignity.

One of those moments for me happened a little bit less than 10 years ago now. I was working through a very difficult assignment. At one point in time during this project, we ended up having to demote somebody. And I was absolutely torn up in the entire process over everything that was happening.

Send an email outlining exactly what the person did that was so awesome to the original recipient and then send the email to the person that you’re talking positively about to let them know. It is a fabulous way of improving engagement.

Preferably, for example, your supervisor, your boss, or somebody else that that person looks up to or would appreciate creating a positive impression with. Then let that person know that you talked about them. One of my favorite ways of doing this is to send an email.

You cannot overstate how critical it is to give positive reinforcement to your people. When you treat your people well, they treat your clients and customers well. It comes through.

And you know what else? I had immaculate customer service the entire time that I was there. Everybody was so kind and so patient. And in fact, assistants who weren’t even involved in my procedure checked in with me afterwards because they knew I was anxious and wanted to make sure that I was okay.

The endontist treated his staff beautifully. I actually made a comment on it to the front desk staff, and they mentioned that he was one of few supervisors they’d ever had who actually complimented them and thanked them for the things that they did and that they did well.