The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them – Ernest Hemingway
How much do you trust your team, chef?
Leading a team is not an easy task. No matter whether you’re an executive chef heading a kitchen of sixty or a demi chef looking after two stagiaires. Getting someone to follow your vision and your instructions, drawing the best out of them and guiding them through challenges takes a lot of energy out of you.
Now, if you’re a good leader, you probably rely on a loyal team who will go the extra mile to help you. But what happens in those instances where you have a new team member on board, or you’re entrusting someone with responsibility that they’ve never handled before? What needs to happen when you’re faced with that feeling of doubt?
If you can recall how you first built your relationship with your most dependable team members, you’ll notice at some point, you stopped judging them and you trusted in their potential. Maybe you had to test them to prove their capability. But when you trusted, you moved out of your head and began to rely on your gut or your inner knowing. Remember, those around you will sense it.
Now, I’m saying this not as a management coach, but from the viewpoint of someone who had to constantly prove herself in the kitchen: when I felt that my head chef trusted in me, I believed in myself. Even when I had to attempt something I had no skill at. It encouraged me to mirror him: to move out of my own head where my fears existed and surrender to the task at hand, giving it my full attention. That, more than anything else increased my chance of performing it successfully (besides of course, clear communication).
I will finish by emphasising the point – leadership is about working on a lot of things at the same time. But letting go when it’s needed is what gets the work done for you.