Groom Your Protege

BursaSnipers

Publish date: Sun, 29 Sep 2019, 03:28 PM

Groom Your Protege

4 The best leaders know they can’t do it all. But who teaches a protege? No matter how brilliant you are, you realize your time and energy are finite, says labor economist Sylvia Ann Hewlett, who authored the book, “The Sponsor Effect: How to Be a Better Leader by Investing in Others.”

The solution: Surround yourself with a great team and find someone who can be your protege.

Learn to become a top-notch sponsor and find the protege who will take you to the next level. Here’s how:

Mentoring Vs. Sponsorships

Mentors mainly offer guidance and act as a sounding board. “But they don’t open doors or use political capital on your behalf,” Hewlett told. “Sponsorship, on the other hand, is a very deliberate investment.”

“(A sponsor) understands your value,” Hewlett added. Over a period of six months or a year, this protege works hard to prove their talent and loyalty in exchange for the leader’s endorsement.

“(You) really do go out on a limb for them,” Hewlett said. “You advocate for a promotion behind closed doors where the candidate is not present. . . . It’s a reciprocal, performance-based alliance,” Hewlett said. “It’s how individuals get from the middle to the top of organizations.”

Seek Diversity

We tend to like people who are similar to us. But a protege needs to be more than a mini-me. Hewlett, who is founder of the New Yorkbased Center for Talent Innovation, says research shows that there’s a particular payoff if you have a star producer who is a loyal, trustworthy protege. This person expands your skill sets or your ability to reach other markets.

“They bring a value add,” Hewlett said.

Hire a woman, or someone who knows a particular geographic market inside and out, or someone who has an LGBTQ identity and therefore understands the profile of that customer, she says.

Hewlett’s own experience as a sponsor reveals the impact of such diversity. Years ago, she hired Tai Green Wingfield as a publicist for CTI but saw her potential beyond her communications skills.

“She put me in roles that I wasn’t initially comfortable in, but I made sure to overproduce because she was going out on a limb for me,” said Green Wingfield, who is now a senior vice president at PR firm Weber Shandwick, where she leads the organization’s diversity, equity and inclusion offering.

Hewlett “knew that she could rely on me,” Green Wingfield said. “She could rely on me to keep her honest. I was making sure to keep my ear to the ground on her behalf. I kept an eye out for opportunities for her and the organizations.”

Learn From The Protege, Too

As it turned out, Green Wingfield provided invaluable perspective on CTI’s research on race relations and the impact it has on the workplace.

“That really came about because I was doing a lot of the on-theground discussions with task-force members and hearing their concerns,” Green Wingfield said. “I was able to bring some of those insights to Sylvia and she greenlighted a project for us to do together on race relations in the workplace and that had a huge impact on the organization.”

Hewlett says she’s humbled by what she didn’t know about the African-American woman’s career journey and that she could not have driven this research project without Green Wingfield’s key input.

To this day, Green Wingfield says, Hewlett continues to keep her end of the bargain. “Sylvia has still been instrumental in introducing me to potential clients,” she said.

Expect Excellence And Loyalty

A protege needs to “deliver 110%,” Hewlett said. “They really help you with your workload. They take an unpleasant task off your shoulders, they find you opportunities and they guard your time.”

In addition to freeing up your time for things you are really indispensable for, a good protege will “have your back,” Hewlett explained. A protege “will spread all kinds of great stories about what’s happening on your team, what an amazing boss you are . . . and burnish your brand. They create a loyalty and a trustworthiness, which are really priceless.”

Expect the protege to do 70% of the work in the sponsoring relationship, Hewlett says. “They’ve really got to produce. They’ve got to give before they get,” Hewlett said.

Then, when a big promotion comes up, sponsoring leaders speak up loudly for proteges. The leader has much to gain, too.

“The senior person is 53% more likely to get a higher rank in leadership,” Hewlett said. “They put wind behind your sails. Who wouldn’t want a committed younger person delivering like crazy, talking you up on social media, creating market opportunity that you can’t access because they have special experiences or identities that allows them to increase your bandwidth in ways you can’t even imagine?”

Discussions

Be the first to like this. Showing 0 of 0 comments

Featured Posts

MQ Trader

Introducing MY's First IPO Fund for Sophisticated Investors!

MQ Chat

New Update. Discover investment communities that resonate with your ideas

MQ Trader

M & A Value Partners IPO Equity Fund has been launched - Targeted 13% Return p.a

Latest Videos