Potential vs. Performance: How Leaders Should Tell the Difference

One of the most common mistakes in promotions is assuming that the best performer will make the best leader. Sometimes they do. Often, the skills that make someone excellent at their own work are different from the ones that help other people do theirs.

The opposite mistake is just as costly: overlooking someone whose results are steady but whose potential is high, because they are newer, quieter or still learning the role.

What potential looks like

Potential tends to show up in traits more than results: curiosity, coachability, drive, humility, emotional intelligence and integrity. People with high potential ask good questions, learn quickly from feedback and, most importantly, make the people around them better, often without a title.

The interview was last year

When I promote someone into leadership, the interview matters less than the last year. I still post the role and interview applicants, and I enjoy learning their goals and why they want it. But I also ask the team, without saying who applied, who they think the next leader should be and who makes the team better. If a team already trusts someone and sees them as their leader, that is the best evaluation you can get.

In one round, the team named someone newer to the organization, and she was promoted. They also named a woman who had not applied. I told her how the team saw her, and she is now in a leadership role at another company. Neither of those decisions would have come from looking at performance numbers alone.

Helping strong performers grow

For a strong performer who is not yet ready to lead, the answer is not no. It is not yet, with a plan. I help build a development plan centered on developing the people around them, because that requires no title. Do the job before you have the title, and the title usually follows.

Seeing potential in yourself

The same distinction applies to your own career. Your current results are not the limit of what you can do. What you have done so far should not decide who you are capable of becoming.

Developing leaders is the focus of You Are Capable of More: Leadership. For the bigger picture, read Human Potential: A Complete Guide, and see How to See Hidden Potential in People.