Three Simple Steps for Growing Your Impact

I was sitting in the front row, ready for my team lead to begin his presentation to forty key customers. He had invited me as a courtesy, or so I thought. Imagine my reaction when he walked to the front and announced, “I have another meeting to attend and must leave. But Tim will be happy to lead you through this session.”

Happy? I do not think that word means what he thinks it means.

I had enough experience to avoid drowning. But it wasn’t a given. And it wasn’t ideal.

Grow Your Impact by Growing Others

If you are a leader, your impact will be far greater through the people you develop than through the product or services you create. One important skill to develop in others is effective interactions with customers (constituents, members, donors, or whatever name you use, but for this post, I’ll stick with “customers”).

There are three steps you can take to nurture this ability, but you must be intentional. Too often leaders overlook them and the team pays the price.

1. Invite Others to Join the Conversation

The first step is to bring team members into the conversations you have with customers. Whether it is inviting them to face-to-face meetings, including them in online meetings or copying them on emails. They need time to discover and learn, without the pressure of producing. What you model is far more effective than any instructions you give. Let them watch.

• Before the encounter, set the proper expectations. Let them know you don’t expect they’ll contribute and the priority is to observe and learn.
• During introductions, communicate to the customer which members are there only for support. This eliminates any awkwardness with an attendee remaining silent during the meeting.
• After the meeting, debrief with your team. Find out what your team members recognized and understood. I recall asking my teammates after many meetings, “Who was the most influential person in the room?”, “Who was most supportive of our position?”, or even, “Why do you think I raised that point?”

2. Allow Others to Shape the Conversation

Once a team member grows comfortable with the conversational and relational dynamics, take opportunities to pull her in during a future meeting. Do it early in the conversation. The longer you wait, the harder it will be for her to have an impact.

Be intentional about having her answer, even when you can handle the response. The transfer of information is not the sole goal; it’s having the right person do the transmitting. See yourself as an orchestra conductor, not a one-person band.

Pick topics in her areas of expertise and comfort. Facts are safer than opinions. Don’t put your teammate on the spot with difficult exchanges. You step in to handle those. Remember, you want her to succeed.

I witnessed a leader that never gave his team members an opportunity to speak in any customer conversations. He would jump in with a response before the customer hit a punctuation point. Once he had the floor, he repeated things three times as if enacting his own personal filibuster. Not only was it irritating and insulting to the customer, but it was demoralizing to his team, and robbed each of them of a chance to grow.

3. Release Others to Drive the Conversation

Even with proper preparation and planning, customer conversations need dynamic adjustments and decisions during a meeting. Those take a skill that a person gains through practice. It’s your responsibility to give them that experience.

Inform and prepare the driver before the meeting. Let her know she can look to you for support, but she should plan to lead the conversation. If it’s an existing customer experienced with you leading, endorse your teammate at the start and explain she’ll be driving. Lend your credibility to her.

The goal is to hand-off with a clap, not a condescending head pat. Guard how much you contribute throughout the conversation. Take control on sticky topics (if your teammate is struggling) or promote her before jumping in (”Sharon raises a good point that I’d like to expand on.”) It will be easy and tempting for you to take control and credit. Resist.

You Got This!

Effective leaders have a destination in mind, one that requires growth in the team. A leader that refuses to relinquish control of customer interactions (or does so poorly) is hindering their team’s ability to scale.

With minor efforts, any leader can grow others to lead effective conversations through these simple steps. Look at your calendar for the next week and invite at least one person with leadership potential to a key customer meeting.