“Not living up to full potential”

What is the potential of this sapling?

This was the epitaph on nearly every one of my grade cards that I can remember growing up. And it is a sentiment that haunts me to this day. Not so much that I feel I was a poor performer or that I even disagreed really, but as I have gotten older and learned more about what I CHOOSE to be capable of, the question of my full potential at age 10 seems anachronistic at best. They may have just as well added “immature,” “irresponsible,” and “unprofessional”; obvious things to put on a 10 year old’s grade card to be sure. My recent thoughts of potential in general have left me stymied. Yet, I have come to a tentative conclusion – unless you are talking about physics, you cannot measure (nor therefore evaluate) potential.

Prior Success is not a guarantor of Future Success

My recent post, Nothing Fails Like Success, pointed out that success as an individual contributor rarely indicated a person’s capability as a manager. But the idea of past performance not being an indicator of potential is more ubiquitous than that. In the realm of business, look at Nokia, or Kodak. Both were pioneers in their business. Ironically enough, Kodak was the first company to produce a digital camera, the technology that eventually lead to its downfall and the evisceration of film photography. When you look at human-kind, you needn’t look further back in history than perhaps 125-150 years ago with the British Empire. Its greatness and expanse unparalleled in all of history. No other empire has ever been able to make the claim “The sun never sets on the XXX Empire.” And yet, like the Ottomans, Romans, Persians, and Greeks before them, they fell.

Historically, you can look back and determine the pinnacle of those countries’ achievements (just like Nokia and Kodak) and quite matter-of-factually state, “that was apparently the limit of their potential.” Again, an anachronism. “Historic potential” is a paradox and yet it seems to be the only accurate way to determine it. So what of evaluating the “full potential” of a 10 year-old? Or perhaps more relevant, a 24 year-old professional? Simple answer, can’t be done.

Evaluate Capability, Not Potential

This is where my wandering rant begins to have a point. Potential is a guess at best. However, I can have glimpses of what someone is capable of. And as a leader, my job is to put people into situations where their capabilities are tested, observed, coached, then unleashed. And again, you cannot base a judgement on future capability in one area by the previous success or failure in another unrelated area (supervision v. individual contributor, for example.) The only way you can get an idea of someone’s capability is to give them the opportunity to do something new. This take a great deal of faith and trust, sadly, these are of short supply in most environments (despite all the talk about empowerment.) But promoting or hiring someone on a guess is scarier still, though it happens all the time. When you hire someone from the outside, you have very little to go on, previous successes (see above), their ability to interview, and perhaps a few hand-picked references that are certain to be groomed towards positive answers. So what is scarier; taking that hard-working performer you’ve seen do a reasonably good job, or hiring someone based on a guess? Talking about your employees’ “potential” simply means you have not given them the chance to show you their “capability”.

Possible versus Probable

“Potential” in other terms can be interpreted what is “possible”, an expanse of action without informed direction. Looking back, was it possible that I could have been a world-class swimmer or math wiz? Sure, but not very probable because I had no interest in doing either. However, had they looked at tests of my capability, they would have gotten a glimpse of what was more probable in my future.

When I was 13, I was a part of an accelerated program and had the opportunity to take the ACT test. This standardized test is usually taken by junior or seniors in high school for college entrance and scholarship qualification. I remember my scores simply because of how well I felt they illustrated my capability (not potential).

At that time, the test measured four areas: Verbal (mostly vocabulary), Math (for grade 9-11 level), Science (logic, reasoning, and analysis), and Reading (comprehension and understanding.) The writing section was added later.  Each section has a possible top score of 36 and then the scores are weighted and averaged into a composite score. My composite score was 18 which put me at about the 45th percentile of the national average – not bad for a kid who was 4 grades beneath the average test taker. Unsurprisingly, my math score was low, I think I got a 10 or 11. I had never really encountered algebra or trigonometry at the high school level and this test  proved (at least at that time) I was not “capable” of that type of math. My verbal score was a little higher, maybe in the 17-18 range but again, I was probably encountering words I had yet to gain exposure to (and really, how often have you used the words “promulgation” or “lachrymose”?) But here is where I did well. In Reading I scored a 24. I loved to read. I loved to read difficult things, challenging ideas, difficult concepts. I had a reasonable capability there. And here was the real kicker; in Science, I scored a 34. A 34! Out of 36! At age 13. Putting me in the top 5% of all test takers! I had a knack for logic, analysis, and interpretation. Here is where, at 13, astute observers could have seen a glimmer of what I was to become, of what I was capable. I was never going to be an engineer or a spelling proofreader. Could I learn those things and be competent in them, sure. But I would be average at best. Where I excelled was in reading and logic. No wonder then that I went on to major in Philosophy as an undergrad.

Sadly, however, the reaction to my Science score was dismissal as a fluke, that I “guessed” well. Something I disproved when I took it again my junior year of high school and scored a 36 out of 36. Every other score went up as well, but the trend stayed the same (math-not so good, verbal-okay, reading-above average, and this time writing-above average.)

To this day, my capability in reasoning and analysis far out pace my “potential” in math. And I could care less about my math potential because I have no interest in it. It was never very probable that would be good at math, primarily because I did not care about it or enjoy doing it. What was probable is I would be average at best. This is the trap we can fall into when looking at our employees in terms of “potential” versus “capability.” We judge what is possible versus probable. In the case of externals hires who are hired solely on potential, we probably end up with average much more than exceptional.

What to do

Giant Sequoia

First, stop talking about your employees’ “potential.” You’re just guessing about possibilities. Second, to judge people’s capability, you have to “test” it. Thinking about moving someone into supervision? Give them a project team to lead. Looking for an event planner? Have someone take the reins on an upcoming celebration. Need someone with strategic thinking? Give them a problem to diagnose and recommend solutions around. Stop guessing about your employees and start learning about them.

Nurture what people are capable of and it is very probable they will take you beyond the potential of what you ever guessed was possible.

Nothing Fails Like Success

It’s not a new notion, things becoming victims of their own success: the worker who is so good at difficult tasks he/she now gets ALL the tough assignments, an efficient project manager now gets held to unrealistic deadlines, a rookie debuts as an all-star only to succumb to steroids under the pressure of continued greatness, companies setting next quarter’s goals off of a stellar previous quarter, and so on. It’s easy to get caught up in success. And while some pitfalls are more apparent than others, some are hard to see. In the realm of management, success as an individual contributor can be the key factor in someone’s downfall as a supervisor.

It’s a common tale: the star performer gets promoted because they are the best on the team at the job…and then they very quickly prove themselves incapable as a manager. They try hard and they want to do a great job but it just isn’t working out for them, the employees, or the company in many cases. One factor (as I have mentioned in other articles) is lack of proper training and support, but a big reason could be the success they enjoyed as a star performing “doer.”

After all this is why they got promoted, right? They were the best at doing the job. So it stands to reason that THEIR way was the best way; at least this is what people tell themselves, consciously or unconsciously. As a result you get micromanagement, the hoarding of knowledge, incomplete delegation, supervision of activity rather than results, etc. Sadly, training does not fix this in most cases because most trainings focus on increasing skills, not awareness. So how do you address this potential roadblock?

Step one is selecting the right candidate for the position. I am not suggesting you pick someone who is not good at their jobs. What I am suggesting is it can’t be your ONLY criteria. The skills and qualities required to be a successful supervisor are not the same as those required to produce a widget, manage a project, create a presentation, or whatever their job happens to be. Promoting someone to supervision solely based on their skill with things might provide you with a supervisor who is just that, good with things, not people.

Step two is being clear about WHY you chose him/her. Yes, for sure the abilities and skill at his/her job is an asset, but how they capitalize on those skills and abilities is very important. If your intent was to get the employees to do things exactly as they did, then by all means tell them that and stop reading this post – you’ll get the drones you are looking for. If you are looking to improve the performance of the group in some way, let them know WHY you think they are the best person to do that and HOW they can use their skills and abilities that are beyond just doing the job.  This is the first part of step three.

Step three is give them more than a handshake to show your support. is a contributor to the difficulty of making the transition. Let’s face it, most people are promoted with a handshake and then told “let me know if you need anything.” The assumption is that great employees are also great managers – despite experience telling us a vastly different story. When they first get hired into non-supervisory positions most people get at least a few days of training. They learn the processes, the best practices, regulations, skills, and expectations of their new role. Yet, a vast majority of managers get nothing. At best they are invited to a few initial meetings to meet people or update them on what projects and goals are in progress. They need training and support and this is where another potential issue can arise.

Entrance to supervision is often the point in people’s career where they are expected to be in charge of their own development. It is now up to them to search, select, enroll, and actually LEARN what they want to learn. This, of course rarely happens, and this may be why. For starters, to this point the employee has had no budgetary decision-making authority, except on how to SAVE the company money. So to look good from a budget perspective, most will not seek out anything that cost money (nevermind, that many are unsure how much they have authority to spend.) Also, they believe they were promoted because they were the best; they were smart, intelligent, and capable – asking for help might imply or hint that they are not those things, and thereby unworthy of the promotion. So most managers will never self select training especially not at the onset, whether it is for fear of spending money or fear of looking incapable, the end result is the same. Nevermind the fact (as I said before) most training is about enhancing skills, not awareness. So even if they do select training and go, their focus tends to be on how they can impact their employees rather than self-reflection and grown.

Preventing the irony of success is more about changing self belief than it is about learning a new skill. Changing beliefs is hard and much of it begins with how we interpret and assign meaning to certain events. Easier than changing a belief that does not serve you is starting with one that does. Pick the right person, tell them why they are the right person for the job, and help them get more support than they think they need.

It is not success itself that fails, it is the belief that what made you successful today is the same as what will make you successful tomorrow.