Here's what to do when you don't have the answers...

Ahoy,

In today’s episode of Reece’s war against ego driven leaders, we have what to do when you don’t have all the answers.

All too often we see people pretending to have all the answers.

The frustrating thing is, even though it is incredibly obvious that these people don’t have all the answers, they still insist on pretending they do!

Where is the leadership benefits of that?

So what do we do if we don’t know all the answers? Let’s take a look.

Firstly, relax. Nobody knows all the answers. Nobody can know all the answers!

It’s not uncommon to feel a sense of imposter syndrome when you first start in a new leadership role.

For years there has been this façade that managers have put on that they all know what they’re doing.

Here’s the secret:

They don’t.

I know it looks like everyone else knows that they’re doing and it feels like you’re the only one that doesn’t, but that simply isn’t true.

Like I said at the beginning, it isn’t possible for someone to know everything!

But we want to follow leaders that exude confidence.

We want to be able to believe that our boss knows what’s going on!

Which is why managers put so much effort into making themselves appear as an authority figure in whatever subject they feel they need to be an expert in.

Ironically, often times this makes them appear the opposite.

So to summarise this point:

Nobody knows everything, you’re not doing anything wrong.

Now we have that out of the way, we can start to look at what to do when you’re in one of these many situations you’ll end up in, where you don’t know the answer.

Point 1: you’re not a politician.

Politicians are a perfect example of people that don’t have all the answers but want to look like they do.

They don’t want to say the wrong thing so often end up speaking a lot of words without actually saying anything.

You’re not a politician. Don’t follow this approach.

It’s not helpful, and you’re not actually fooling anyone. We can all see you don’t know what you’re talking about!

So what can you do instead?

Accept you don’t know the answer.

Maybe you know some information that can help, but not all of it.

Or maybe you don’t have any of the information.

Either way, be honest with yourself.

Nobody benefits from you giving out wrong information and setting people off in the wrong direction.

Accept your limitations and own up to them.

This doesn’t mean saying things like;

“Wow I’m so useless, I don’t have a clue!”

Or “No idea, I’m not a very useful boss am I!”

It means owning up to the gap in your knowledge in a way that is helpful.

“I’m not 100% certain to be honest. What I do know is…”

And “Not sure on that one however, if you go and speak to x, y, z they’ll be able to help…”

See the difference?

Now you might be thinking that this would impact your credibility?

And credibility is a whole other topic for another day, but to quickly cover its relevance here, the answer is simple.

Your credibility will be impacted far greater if you start pretending to know things you know nothing about.

Your team aren’t stupid, they’ll see right through you.

It takes a level of confidence in ones own competence to admit where there is a gap in their knowledge.

Obviously this whole point falls off if you’re not prepared at all!

But if you’re here, chances are you’re not the kind of person that is completely unprepared for their job!

In short:

• You can’t know everything

• So don’t pretend like you do

• Be honest with the gap in your knowledge

• But still be as prepared as you realistically can be

As always, have a great day.

Reece