The Peter Principle aside, leaders and team members don’t advance in organizations unless they are highly competent and produce quality work.
Everyone knows that organizations reward the highest performers with more responsibility and more positional authority.
This is especially true early in a career when competence and expertise clearly differentiate who can be counted upon to deliver great work.
But sometimes leaders and team members develop a strong, but narrow, expertise and become too good at what they do. They become indispensable in doing the job or playing the role.
They prove every day that they are better than anyone else in their area of expertise. No one else could fill their shoes.
In an odd irony, their competence and high performance make them more valuable to the organization right where they are. Which is exactly the problem.
As a result, some high performers are kept where they are most useful for long periods of time rather than moved to where they can learn and grow.
Over time, they do the job so well that they become invisible in the promotion process.
Because there is no one else who can add the value they do in the role they are in, they remain stuck. Their high performance stifles their career rather than advancing it.
To escape this trap, these high performers must coach and mentor others to do what they do and at the same level, thus replacing themselves by design. They become less indispensable.
The first steps in this process are to begin documenting exactly how they do their work and then delegating portions of the process.
Once a “backfill” candidate exists or is in process, the high performer’s next move is to seek assignments and projects that help them develop new competencies and skills.
Letting others know they have a strong appetite for new challenges is also critical. Even small assignments allow people to showcase their diverse talents.
As a last resort, high performers trapped in place by their own competence should explore opportunities outside the team or organization.
They have more leverage than they typically think.
Pursuing a move has a way of clarifying their value to decision-makers in need of a wake-up nudge.
Organizations can’t afford to have high performers leave simply because they are stuck in a role. When a team member is too valuable to move up, they are also too valuable to move on.
High performers must remind everyone that their skills should open doors, not lock them.
