What leaders do that makes people with untapped potential go bigger.
If You're Standing on the Edge, You're Taking Up Too Much Room
When I was an area manager in retail, our group of stores called ourselves The Edge. Our motto was: "If you're standing on the edge, you're taking up too much room."
It meant Go For It. Go big or o home. If you're not going to commit, step aside and let someone else through. We were all in our twenties, working so hard it felt like family. We weren't standing on the edge. We were all in, as individuals and as a team of teams. Five years earlier, I had spent months next to Brent in a spinal unit, who had become a paraplegic in a street racing accident. I had learned that when Life as you know it all goes away knowing that you still matter is a need not a want. Later on when I studied this at Uni I learned science supports when people feel seen, heard and valued they lean in and their engage. My people mattered, and I let them know that consistently. Our area became the most profitable in the country, retention and morale was high and we were proud of our the results our hard work achieved.
Why this discussion matters
Gallup says managers account for 70% of the variance in team engagement. Not the CEO or the values on the wall. The person people report directly to.
Google tried to prove managers don't matter, launching a multi-year study in 2008 called Project Oxygen. The data proved the opposite. Teams with great managers got better results, were happier and stayed longer.
A story from the winningest teamblack jersey
The All Blacks, New Zealand’s national rugby team are widely called the winningest team in world sport.
But in 2004, they had a culture problem. Graham Henry, Wayne Smith and Gilbert Enoka came up with a simple line: Better People Make Better All Blacks.
Then they did something most leaders would find difficult or counter intuitive. They gave power away. Senior players formed a leadership group and were given autonomy, trusted with key decisions. Every player was given their own area of responsibility. Enoka had one more rule: no dickheads. Talent alone didn't get you in.
Between 2011 and 2015 Rugby World Cups, they won 95% of their rugby tests, and both World Cups.
Then came a little talked about part. By 2023 the team had slipped from first to fourth in the world. Yet that same year, the All Blacks were still rated the most valuable brand in rugby, worth NZ$452 million, extraordinarily disproportionate from a country of about five million people. What they'd built in people held fast.
And they're not even New Zealand's most successful rugby team. The Black Ferns have the highest winning percentage of any international rugby team, with six World Cup titles.
The science: three things the best leaders do
Look at the rugby field, the Olympic podium and the best places to work. The same three things keep showing up. They line up with the three human needs in Self-Determination Theory.
They coach, not just tell. When Google ranked what its best managers do best, the number one comment was "is a good coach". The best at growing others. Competence.
They hand over the keys. Google's number two: empowers the team and doesn't micromanage. The All Blacks handed decisions to players. People stretch further when the stretch is theirs. That's autonomy.
They care about the person, not just the performance. Researchers Sophia Jowett and Ian Cockerill interviewed 12 Olympic medallists about their coaches. What mattered was the relationship: open communication, trust and encouragement. Google found the same thing in an office: great managers show interest in their people's success and wellbeing. Seen, heard and valued. That's relatedness.
The Sleepwalking Effect™ is at play when leaders repeat small habits that shrink people without noticing they’re responsible. The ACT model is a reset determining the small habits that grow them.
ACT Reset
Awaken. Who on your team is standing on the edge right now? Holding back, not quite in?
Curiosity. Which one are they missing from you: coaching, the keys, or care?
Try. This week, hand one real decision to someone who's been waiting for it. Then coach, don't take it back.
The challenge
Maybe the person taking up too much room isn't on your team. Maybe it's you.
What's one decision you'll hand over this week?
Sources
Kerr, J. (2013), Legacy
Jowett and Cockerill (2003), "Olympic medallists' perspective of the athlete–coach relationship", Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 4(4), 313–331
