A Con Game Is NOT a Good Leadership Strategy

The Background Story

Several months ago, I was sitting with Sam who had just been named a VP of Sales at a company who was struggling.  Sam had an engineering background and had had no leadership skills at all which is why they were seeking our help.

Sam’s boss, the CEO, felt like Sam’s energy and enthusiasm for sales and his competence at the subject matter end of the business would be a perfect match for him leading a sales team.

But there was a problem…

It was Sam’s personality. He was manipulative.

Obviously when we asked Sam if he felt like he was playing a con game, he vehemently defended his actions. Most of his manipulative strategies centered around something “he did to his salespeople, so that they would do something they didn’t want to do.”

On one occasion, he spoke of intentionally making a salesperson mad one day so that he could ride in and become the savior the next day, thereby endearing Sam in his new salesperson’s eyes.  Extremely manipulative.

The wonder of it all is that not one of Sam’s direct reports was inspired or motivated by him (according to the CEO who had witnessed some of this behavior and its effects on Sam’s people).

The fact is that people have a sixth sense about manipulation. They can detect what you’re up to.  If your behavior is all about doing something to get someone to do something else, then you might be in a massive con struggle and you don’t know it.  If you spend your time scheming on how you’re going to “Get someone to do something” then you are Sam.

A Better Leadership Approach

A better way to approach these things is to have a one-on-one, transparent conversation where you speak with your team member to determine what they are interested in, afraid of, and reluctant to do and you then come up with collaborative solutions for that.

That is much more inspiring than being a con artist. And, it’s less work.