Multipliers
Liz Wiseman, 2010
Table of contents
1: The Multiplier Effect
Multipliers vs Diminishers
- multipliers - leaders are genius makers who bring out the intelligence in others. they built collective, viral, intelligence in organizations
- diminishers - these leaders are absorbed in their own intelligence, stifle others, and deplete the organization of crucial intelligence and capability
The Five Disciplines of Multipliers
- The Talent Magnet: Attracts and optimizes talent
- The Liberator: Requires people’s best thinking
- The Challeneger: Extends challenges
- The Debate Maker: Debates decisions
- The Investor: Instills accountability
Accidental Diminisher
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much of the diminishing that happens in the workplace is a result of well-intended leaders whose honest attempts ot lead or be helpful shut down ideas and cause others to hold back
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by extracting people’s full capability, Multipliers get twice the capability from people as Diminishers
2: The Talent Magnet
- Empire Builder - brings in great talent, but under-utilizes it because they board resources and use them only for their own gain
- Talent Magnets - get access to the best talent because people flock to work for them, knowing they will be fully utilized and developed to be ready for the next stage
The Four Practices of the Talent Magnet
- Look for Talent Everywhere
- Appreciate all types of genius
- Ignore boundaries
- Find People’s Native Genius
- Look for what is native
- Label it
- Utilize People to Their Fullest
- Connect people with opportunities
- Shine a spotlight
- Remove the Blockers
- Get rid of prima donnas
- Get out of the way
Becoming a Talent Magnet
- Name the Genius
- Supersize it
- Let go of a superstar
Leveraging Resources
| Empire Builders | Talent Magnets | |
|---|---|---|
| What They Do | Hoard resources and underutilize talent | Attract talent and deploy it at its highest point of contribution |
| What They Get | A reputation as the person A players should avoid working for (“the place you go to die”) | A reputation as the person A players should work for (“the place you go to grow”) |
| Underutilized people whose capability atrophies | Fully utilized people whose genius continues to expand | |
| Disillusioned A players who don’t reach out to other A players | Inspired A players who attract other A players into the organization | |
| A stagnation of talent where disillusioned A players quit and stay | A flow of A players attracting other A players as they then move up and out of the org |
Unexpected Findings
- Both Talent Managers and Empire Builders attract top talent. What differentiates them is what they do with the talent once it’s in the door.
- Talent Magnets don’t run out of talent by moving their people to bigger, better opportunities, because there is a steady stream of talent wanting to get into their organization.
3: The Liberator
- Tyrants create a tense environment that supresses peopel’s thinking and capability. As a result, people hold back, bring up safe ideas that the leader agress with, and work cautiously.
- Liberators create an intense environment that requires people’s best thinking and work. As a result, people offer thier best and boldest thinking and give their best effort.
The Three Practices of the Liberator
- Create Space
- Release others by restraining yourself
- Shift the ratio of listening to talking
- Define a space for discovery
- Level the playing field
- Demand Best Work
- Defend the standard
- Distinguish best work from outcomes
- Generate Rapid Learning Cycles
- Admit and share mistakes
- Insist on learning from mistakes
Becoming a Liberator
- Play fewer chips
- Label your opinions
- Talk up your mistakes
- Make space for mistakes
Leveraging Resources
| Tyrants | Liberators | |
|---|---|---|
| What They Do | Create a tense environment that suppresses people’s thinking and capability | Create an intense environment that requires people’s best thinking and work |
| What They Get | People hold back but appear to be engaged on the surface | People who offer their best thinking and really engage their full brainpower |
| Safe ideas the leader already agrees with | The best and boldest ideas | |
| People who work cautiously, avoid taking risks, and find excuses for any mistakes they make | People who give their full effort and will go out on a limb and learn quickly from any mistakes |
Unexpected Findings
- The path of least resistance is often the path of tyranny. Because many organizations are skewed, a leader can be above average in an organization and still operate as a Tyran.
- Liberators maintain a duality of giving people permission to think while also creating an obligation for them to do their best work.
- Multipliers are intense. Leaders who can discern and create the difference between a tense and an intense climate can access significantly more brainpower from their organizations.
4: The Challenger
- KNOW-IT-ALLS give directives that showcase how much they know. As a result they limit what their organization can achieve to what they themselves know how to do. The organization uses its energy to deduce what the boss thinks.
- CHALLENGERS define opportunities that challenge people to go beyond what they know how to do. As a result they get an organization that understands the challenge and has the focus and energy to take it on.
The Three Practices of the Challenger
- Seed the Opportunity
- Show the need
- Challenge the assumptions
- Reframe problems
- Create a starting point
- Lay Down a Challenge
- Extend a concrete challenge
- Ask the hard questions
- Let others fill in the blanks
- Generate Belief in What is Possible
- Helicopter down
- Cocreate the plan
- Orchestrate an early win
Becoming a Challenger
- Take the extreme questions challenge
- Create a stretch challenge
- Take a bus trip
- Take a massive baby step
Leveraging Resources
| Know-It-Alls | Challengers | |
|---|---|---|
| What They Do | Give directives that showcase “their” knowledge | Define opportunities that challenge people to go beyond what they know how to do |
| What They Get | Distracted efforts as people vie for the attention of the boss | Collective intent toward the same overarching opportunity |
| Idle cycles in the organization as people wait to be told what to do or to see if the boss will change direction again | Rapid cycles and accelerated problem solving with out the initiation of the formal leader | |
| An organization that doesn’t want to get ahead of the boss | People’s discretionary effort and intellectual energy to take on the toughest organizational challenges |
Unexpected Findings
- Even when leaders have a clear view of the future, there are advantages to simply seeding opportunities.
- Challengers have full range of motion: they can see and articulate the big thinking and ask the big questions, but they can also connect that to the specific steps needed to create movement.
- If you ask people to take on the impossible in the right way, it can actually create more safety than if you ask for something easier.
5: The Debate Maker
- DECISION MAKERS decide efficiently with a small inner circle, but they leave the broader organization in the dark to debate the soundness of the decision instead of executing it.
- DEBATE MAKERS engage people in debating the issues up front, which leads to sound decisions that people understand and can execute efficiently.
The Three Practices of the Debate Maker
- Frame the Issue
- Define the question
- Form the team
- Assemble the data
- Frame the decision
- Spark the Debate
- Create safety for best thinking
- Demand rigor
- Drive a Sound Decision
- Reclarify the decision-making process
- Make the decision
- Communicate the decision and rationale
Becoming a Debate Maker
Make a debate with four asks: 1) Ask the hard question, 2) ask for evidence, 3) ask everyone, 4) ask people to switch.
Leveraging Resources
| Decision Makers | Debate Makers | |
|---|---|---|
| What They Do | Engage a select inner circle in the decision-making process | Access a wide spectrum of thinking in a rigorous debate before making decisions |
| What They Get | Underutilization of the bulk of their resources, while a select few are overworked | High utilization of the bulk of their resources |
| A lack of info from those closest to the action, resulting in poorer decisions | Real info they need to make sound decisions | |
| Too many resources thrown at those who don’t have the understanding they need to execute the decisions effectively | Efficient execution with lower resource levels because they have built a deep understanding of the issues, which readies the or to execute |
Unexpected Findings
- As a leader, you can have a very strong opinion but also facilitate debate that creates room for other people’s views. Data is the key.
- Debate Makers are equally comfortable being the decision maker in the end. They are not only consensus-driven leaders.
- Rigorous debate doesn’t break down a team; it builds the team and makes it stronger.
6: The Investor
- MICROMANAGERS manage every detail in a way that creates dependence on the leader and their presence for the organization to perform.
- INVESTORS give other people the investment and ownership they need to produce results independent of the leader.
The Three Practices of the Investor
- Define Ownership
- Name the lead
- Give ownership for the end goal
- Stretch the role
- Invest Resources
- Teach and coach
- Provide backup
- Hold People Accountable
- Give it back
- Expect complete work
- Respect natural consequences
Becoming an Investor
- Give 51 percent of the vote
- give people a say in the work
- Let nature take its course
- let the painful lessons happen
- Ask for the F-I-X
- don’t suggest problems without giving solutions
- Give it back
- giving back leadership and accountability to those doing work
Leveraging Resources
| Micromanagers | Investors | |
|---|---|---|
| What They Do | Manage every detail of the work to ensure it is completed the way they would do it | Give other people the ownership for results and invest in their success |
| What They Get | People who wait to be told what to do | People who take initiative and anticipate challenge |
| People who hold back because they expect to be interupted and told what to do instead | People who are fully focused on achieving results | |
| Free riders who wait for the boss to swoop in and save them | People who can get ahead of the boss in solving problems | |
| People who try to “work” their bosses and make sophisticated excuses | People who respond to the natural forces around them |
Unexpected Findings
- Multipliers do get involved in the operational details, but they keep the ownership with other people.
- Multipliers are rated 42 percent higher at delivering world-class results than their Diminisher counterparts.4
7: The Accidental Diminisher
ACCIDENTAL DIMINISHERS are managers who, despite the very best of intentions, have a diminishing impact on the people they lead.
Accidental Diminisher Profiles
- Idea Guy : Creative, innovative thinkers who think they are stimulating ideas in others
- Always On : Dynamic, charismatic leaders who think their energy is infectious
- Rescuer : Empathetic leaders who are quick to help when they see people struggling
- Pacesetter : Achievement-oriented leaders who lead by example and expect others to notice and follow
- Rapid Responder : Leaders who are quick to take action believing that they are building an agile, action-oriented team
- Optimist : Positive, can-do leaders who think their belief in people will inspire them to new heights
- Protector : Vigilant leaders who shield people from problems to keep them safe
- Strategist : Big thinkers who cast a compelling vision thinking they are showing people a better place and providing the big picture
- Perfectionist : Leaders who strive for excellence and manage the fine details to help others produce superior work
Decreasing your Accidental Diminisher Tendencies
- Seek feedback
- Lead with intention
- Practice the workarounds and learning experiments found in appendix E, “Multiplier Experiments”
- Do less and challenge more
8: Dealing with Diminishers
You can be a Multiplier while working for a Diminisher.
Breaking the Cycle of Diminishing
- It’s not necessarily about you
- Diminishing isn’t inevitable
- You can lead your leader
Dealing with Diminisher Strategies
Level 1: Defenses Against the Dark Arts of Diminishing Managers
Basic survival strategies intended to improve your reactions to Diminishers, relieve stress, neutralize immediate problems, and halt the downward spiral.
- Turn down the volume
- Strengthen other connections
- Retreat and regroup
- Send the right signals
- Assert your capability
- Ask for performance intel
- Shop for a new boss
Level 2: Multiplying Up
Offense plays to help you be a Multiplier to those above you in the organization or to diminishing colleagues at your side, especially Accidental Diminishers.
- Exploit your boss’s strengths
- Give them a user’s guide
- Listen to learn
- Admit your mistakes
- Sign up for a stretch
- Invite them to the party
Level 3: Inspiring Multiplier Leadership in Others
Strategies that raise awareness and encourage leaders to make the shift from Accidental Diminisher to a more intentional Multiplier.
- Assume positive intent
- Address one issue at a time
- Celebrate progress
9: Becoming a Multiplier
Starting the Journey
- Resonance
- Realization of the Accidental Diminisher
- Resolve to be a Multiplier
The Accelerators
- Start with the assumptions
- Work the extremes (neutralize a weakness; top off a strength)
- Run an experiment
- Ask a colleague
- Brace yourself for setbacks
Elements of a Culture
- Common language : Words and phrases that hold a common meaning within a community based on opinions, principles, and values
- Learned behavior s: A set of learned responses to stimuli
- Shared beliefs : The acceptance of something as true
- Heroes and legends : People who are admired or idealized for their qualities, behavior, and/or achievements and the stories told about heroic actions
- Rituals and norms : Consistent behavior regularly followed by an individual or a group
Building a Multiplier Culture
Common Language
- Hold a book talk
- Discuss Accidental Diminishers
Learned Behavior
- Introduce Multiplier mindsets
- Teach Multiplier skills
- Fuse Multipliers with daily decisions
Shared Beliefs
- Codify a leadership ethos
Heroes and Legends
- Spotlight Multiplier moments
- Measure managers
Rituals and Norms
- Pilot a Multiplier practice
- Integrate practices with business metrics
Thoughts
Multipliers is a book about control, and where we cede it and where we seize it as leaders. It revolves around the idea that leaders are better served empowering those underneath them to own their outputs, that many people working slightly better is much better than one working perfectly. A multiplier is one who enables their direct reports, while a diminisher is a tyrannical control freak. It is filled with heuristics and tricks on how to give more power to those subordinate to you; in fact, it argues, that is your role – to manage the work rather than do it. It is a book written for managers on how to influence their people, to get the best effort and create a workplace that people want to work in.
In a lot of ways, we’ve seen these ideas before: the world has moved past unthinking hierarchy, empower teams to succeed, build an environment of psychological safety, be biased for corporate survivors, solicit feedback, and don’t be an asshole. Modern business books seem to all involve picking a mix of these and a few other ideas, building a nice metaphor on top, complete with Briggs-Meyer-esque assessment techniques (how else would you monetize your system further?), and building that into a consultancy apparatus.
That being said, the metaphor is effective, and the underlying philosophy is sound as far as it goes. I would have liked to see a bit more attention paid to the cognitions that underpin a diminisher. The book just rounds up a grab bag of behaviors and builds these into the diminisher or multiplier archetypes, giving a handful of mental tricks and devices to break out of the behavior. I’d like to know what compels the diminishing behavior to address it there; am I a control freak, do I seek recognition at the expense of others, am I addicted to being the hero who saves the day, etc. That might be more powerful than just building an electric dog collar to zap yourself when you are informed of diminishing tendencies.
Also, Wiseman seems to fetishize intelligence and downplay power dynamics. The pages are strewn with Harvard MBAs and geniuses and senior vice presidents. Can I aspire to being a mutliplier, in my lowly state with no direct reports? How can I make ceding control look like the right thing to do when I need to be building trust to my colleagues and those above me in the org chart?
All in all, a decent book, but nothing ground-breaking. I will say it did prompt some interesting thoughts on the nature of control and on my unthinking biases towards them, so as far as mental kindling, it did the trick for a short read.