What happens when the job changes but nobody tells the person doing it?
A leader who once seemed to have everything under control begins to struggle. Decisions take longer. Problems keep finding their way back to the CEO. Other departments become frustrated because commitments are missed or priorities keep changing.
The natural question is: “What has happened to this person?”
But there is another question worth asking first:
What has happened to the work?
As an organization grows and matures, a role can change substantially even when its title and occupant stay the same. Someone who was fully capable of doing the work yesterday may now be facing a fundamentally different job.
Recognizing that change is essential to managing growth. It is also essential to treating people fairly.
Growth changes the nature of the work
We often describe organizational growth in numbers: more revenue, more employees, more customers, more locations.
Those numbers matter. But they do not tell the whole story.
Growth can also bring more complex work. Decisions involve more moving parts. Actions in one function have greater consequences for another. Leaders must look further ahead and make decisions whose results will take longer to emerge.
Consider a founder who begins by personally delivering a service. The founder knows the customers, does the work, and deals directly with problems as they arise.
As demand grows, the founder hires people. Now the work includes assigning tasks, setting expectations, developing employees, and ensuring that the team delivers consistently.
Later, the business needs managers who can lead their own teams. The founder must create the conditions in which those managers can succeed, coordinate their work, and build the operating processes that will support further growth.
At each stage, the head of the organization needs to add a different kind of value.
Being exceptionally good at the work of the previous stage does not, by itself, prepare someone for the next.
A simple way to understand levels of work
The first three levels of work help explain this transition.
Level 1 work involves delivering an output within an established context. A transactional salesperson, for example, works with customers, knows the product very well, and Fill’s orders as required. There is judgment involved, but the person’s primary focus is on completing the work assigned.
Level 2 work involves diagnosing problems and ensuring that a team can deliver. A sales manager must understand why results vary, identify obstacles, develop team members, and adjust how the work is carried out. Personally closing more sales cannot substitute for making the team more effective.
Level 3 work involves designing a sequence of connected actions that produces results over a longer period. A sales director may need to build a market expansion plan, anticipate the capabilities it will require, and establish the steps through which the organization will achieve it.
These distinctions are about the complexity of the work. A title alone does not tell us which level a role requires.
In a young business, the founder may spend much of the day doing Level 1 work. As the organization matures, its continued success may require the founder to work at Level 2, then Level 3, and potentially beyond.
The challenge is recognizing when that transition is necessary and changing the organization to support it.
The CEO can move ahead of the team
A CEO who can see the next stage of the organization’s development may begin pulling it toward greater complexity.
The CEO sees how the business could enter new markets, build new capabilities, or operate through a stronger management structure. Decisions begin to reflect that larger picture.
But the members of the executive leadership team may not move at the same rate.
The operations leader who was excellent at keeping a small business running may now need to design a production system that supports several locations. The sales leader who built strong customer relationships may now need to develop a coordinated growth plan through other managers.
Their titles may remain unchanged. Their commitment may be as strong as ever. Yet the problem-solving demands of their roles may have increased substantially.
This can create a painful misunderstanding.
The CEO feels that a trusted colleague is no longer delivering. The colleague feels that expectations have become unclear or that nothing they do is good enough.
Both may be responding to a change in the work that has never been explicitly discussed.
People mature too, but on different timelines
Organizational maturation and individual maturation are related, but they do not run on the same clock.
Elliott Jaques’ research on work complexity and human capability proposed that people’s capacity to handle more complex work matures over their lifetimes, following different developmental paths. People do not necessarily reach the same levels or reach them at the same time.
This helps explain why a capable, committed person may struggle when the complexity of a role increases.
The transition from Level 1 to Level 2 involves moving from declarative problem solving toward diagnostic problem solving. The transition from Level 2 to Level 3 requires serial problem solving: thinking through a connected sequence in which one action enables the next.
Training and experience matter. They build the skills and knowledge people need to apply their capability effectively. But we should not assume that a course or a stretch assignment will immediately produce the problem-solving capability required for a more complex role.
Nor should we assume that difficulty today defines someone’s potential for the rest of their career.
The practical question is whether the person can do the work the role requires now.
Start by understanding the role
Before concluding that someone can no longer succeed, the CEO needs to make the changed work explicit.
What decisions must the person now make? What problems must they solve independently? How far ahead must they plan? What value must they add to the work of their direct reports?
A growing workload may require more resources. Greater complexity may require a different level of capability. Confusing the two can lead to the wrong response.
Then consider the three fundamental capabilities:
- Problem-solving capability: Can the person handle the complexity of the role?
- Skills and knowledge: Do they know enough to perform the work effectively?
- Valuing the work: Do they want to do the work the role now requires?
These questions point to different actions.
A knowledge gap may call for training. A lack of interest may call for a different role. A mismatch in problem-solving capability requires a careful examination of the work and the person’s current capacity to undertake it.
It is also important to check that accountabilities, authority, resources, and managerial support are clear. People should have a fair opportunity to succeed before conclusions are drawn about their capability.
Honour the contribution and address the present need
Someone who helped build an organization deserves recognition for that contribution.
They also deserve an honest conversation about how their role has changed.
Sometimes a person can succeed with clearer expectations, better support, and targeted development. Sometimes the organization needs another management level, allowing an experienced leader to continue contributing in a role that fits their capability.
In other cases, a different role within the organization may be appropriate. Occasionally, there will be no suitable fit.
These decisions can be difficult, especially when the relationship stretches back to the early days of the business. Delaying the conversation, however, can leave the person struggling while others quietly compensate.
Past success remains real. It does not disappear because the organization now needs different work.
A fair response respects that history while addressing what the organization requires today.
A final thought
Before asking why a trusted person is falling behind, ask whether you have explained how their job has changed.
Who in your organization may be doing a different job today, even though their title has never changed?
Recognizing that change is the first step. Deciding how to respond can be harder, especially when long-standing relationships and gratitude for past contributions influence your judgment. A trusted peer group gives you a place to examine your assumptions, learn from leaders who have faced similar transitions, and consider how your own leadership needs to evolve.
This is one of the advantages of membership in a Vistage peer advisory group. Confidential conversations with other business leaders, supported by one-to-one coaching, help you work through difficult decisions and commit to the actions they require. As your organization matures, that support can help you grow alongside it.
If these questions resonate with you, visit my program page to learn more and arrange a complimentary 30-minute coffee with me. We can discuss the challenges you are facing and explore whether my group would be a good fit.
