The Need for Competence

Competence is a requirement for anyone who wants others to follow her. Far too often we watch in horror as someone botches the job for the entire group because of incompetence in leading them.

Does this sound familiar? If so I need your story. 

I recently watched Undercover Boss, a current reality series on television. Each week the bigwig of a large company goes undercover, working at entry-level jobs. I have seen them package goods for shipping, make sandwiches, run a PowerPoint for a college class, and lead dancing on a cruise ship. In every case the boss wasn’t particularly competent! 

Obviously, his real job doesn’t include such tasks, being a CEO requires other strengths than those who do the day to day work. But how able should the leader be in the skills of those who work under her? Or how much should she at least know about the jobs? Should these undercover bosses have already been more in tune with the tasks of those who work for them or is that unnecessary to what it means for them to be competent leaders?

I am looking for stories for the book that I am writing on leadership—focused not on CEO’s but day-to-day leaders, like you are in your areas of influence. One requirement for a leader is competence, and I want to include real stories. Maybe you have one.

Have you ever been in charge of something without knowing what you were doing? How did you gain the competence needed to get the job accomplished? Have you ever led a team to accomplish something? Maybe you were never taught or shown what you supposed to do or how to do it until you were committed. Perhaps it was a job that you took without realizing the strengths or skills needed and you were basically misplaced in the position.  How did the story turn out?

Or possibly you have a story of an incompetent person leading you. What happened?

If you share a story, I may or may not use it, but I would love to read it!