Show Leadership: Ask down, Tell up
October 10, 2007
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The role of a leader is not to tell others what to do. The leader brings out the best in everybody and therefore the best out of the organization. If you work in a hierarchical settings there is one rule you can implement that will immediately change the work of the organization for the better:
Ask down, tell up.
What does this mean?
Don’t let people ask you what they have to do. Many people in an organization will try to ask the leader what to do. That way they are covered. But that is not what you hire people for. You hire people to solve a problem, not to find a problem and bring it to you. Don’t accept it when people bring problems to you. Send them back and say: “see me when you have a solution. Tell me the solution.”
Asking shows that you trust the judgement of your staff. That is the crucial counterpart to “tell up.” If you have a problem, go to your staff with the question, not with the answer. Not only do you show that you trust their judgement, you show that you care about those will most likely carry out whatever decision you end up making.
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