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Why is developing expertise necessary for a leader

Why is developing expertise necessary for a leader

Summary: Expertise for a leader is like sitting on a gold mine waiting to be shoved. It carries many opportunities for growth and development if chosen to be mined. Building expertise tends to increase one’s social power. However, it takes time and effort to build it. When others look for direction, you are the one who has to guide them with your expertise and it is the need of the hour that leaders realize the importance of developing their expertise in and beyond.

Elon Musk the CEO of a few great companies, is the man you need to learn from if you want to understand the relationship between expertise and effective leadership.1 Well, his story is a little different, he had developed technical knowledge and expertise before he became a leader. But he is excellent at both. His knowledge is vast, evident from the companies he started, like a multinational electric automotive company dealing with the science of batteries and solar energy, and a multinational financial technology company and many more. His technical skills are so advanced that he created all these companies from scratch, inspired many on the way, and became a successful leader.  

So what are three habits to effectively develop expertise for a leader?

What do you really want to build your expertise in?

Developing expertise will take a lot of time and effort. It requires you to build a very strong foundation on the subject matter that you want to become an expert at. Reading a lot about the latest trends outside your company can increase your interest, helping you target the next matter you want to become an expert in.2 Reading and sharing your knowledge to others expands and tests your foundation on the subject, making a master of it. Once you have identified the interested field of expertise, you can follow the next step.

Go and do it yourself!

Once you have developed a good foundation in the industry that you are very interested in, you need to practice it in real life. You are a leader; you should know that your experiences in your field taught you more valuable lessons than the books. But for you to have meaningful lessons in the field, you must carry a solid knowledge base on the subject matter.3 Apply the skill in the practical world, fail, re-learn, and re-apply. You have ample opportunity to fail and re-learn to develop expertise, but you must be hands-on with those skills.

Ask the right questions to your team while searching for an answer yourself.

As a leader, it is one of your responsibilities to elicit the right answers to the right questions. It is your responsibility to make others work for you. Building expertise is a secondary task for you, as the experts in the field are the ones who are going to find the right answer. Going on a quest all by yourself to find the right answer is foolish, as you will be wasting your leadership abilities. You are supposed to work with your team collectively while enhancing your expertise and knowledge in the field. Ask the team for a creative solution to a persisting problem, and search for the answers with them or in your own time. This is how you will be able to challenge your team more, and allow them to grow.

Impact on Leadership

Being an avid learner radiates passion and a never-ending thirst for knowledge. As experts, leaders serve as role models for learning and expanding team skill sets. Research says that explicit knowledge of the subject area impacts the functionality of the leaders and the team.4 Developing expertise is one of the ways to be perceived as powerful and credible as a leader.

Star Mindset

Expertise is something that you possess, as opposed to authority, which is dependent on your official position. It is available to everyone, regardless of rank or position within their business. For example, you might be the only team member who is knowledgeable about a specific piece of software or the go-to resource for market information.

3 Immediately Applicable Action Steps

  1. Read a lot! On your phone, newspapers, and magazines, etc. 
  2. Talk to your peers and employees about their interests and share your knowledge. 
  3. At the end of the week, identify a field which can improve your productivity. For example, consider how you can make more time by automating chores.

References

  1. Bersin, J. (2012, June 8). Why Leaders Must Be Experts: Keys to Success From GE. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbersin/2012/03/09/why-leaders-must-be-experts-keys-to-success-from-ge/?sh=6c8ca1ec2cf3 
  2. Bersin, J. (2012, March 9). Why Leaders Must Be Experts: Keys to Success From GE. Forbes. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbersin/2012/03/09/why-leaders-must-be-experts-keys-to-success-from-ge/?sh=73443ce22cf3
  3. Transform Your Technical Expertise into Leadership. (2021, May 24). Harvard Business Review, https://hbr.org/2021/05/transform-your-technical-expertise-into-leadership
  4. Germain, M. L. (2012). Traits and skills theories as the nexus between leadership and expertise: Reality or fallacy? Performance Improvement, 51(5), 32–39  https://doi.org/10.1002/pfi.21265

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