Lead, Follow, or Get Out of the Way

“Lead, follow, or get out of the way.” Thomas Paine said it. Lee Iacocca said it. I’ve said. After reading this, you may too.

I’m convinced that leading, following, or getting out of the way are the roles a project team member can play. And to be clear I’m not talking about assigned or organizational roles. I’m talking about emotional or “spiritual” roles.

Leading and following are easy to understand. And what a project manager should expect. Team members should step up and take control of their assigned tasks… they lead. Team members should follow the task leaders and perform the work they are assigned… they follow.

The third role is the most difficult to handle as a project manager. The fact is it might be better for everyone if the team member actually does get out of the way if they can’t lead or follow. What is destructive is the team member appears engaged but isn’t. They commit to performing a task then must be watched like a hawk. They grumble and grouse to other team members and their peers. They undermine the project and can burn resource cycles (to say nothing of tempers).

So how does a project manager handle a team member that should get out of the way but doesn’t? There are many different ways. They can sit down with the team member and explain “the facts of life” and hope they listen. They can sit down with the team member’s manager and explain the situation. They can examine how work is communicated and reported to make sure there isn’t something wrong there. They can role play, use team dynamics, peer pressure, performance rewards, etc.

The project manager should do what they are comfortable doing but they must do something. They must have team members in either leading or following roles or they must move them off the team. To not do that puts the project at risk, the company at risk, and the project manager at risk.