David G. Jensen, Contributing Editor01.28.16
Perhaps you are a scientist, engineer or salesperson, and not a manager. Perhaps you even like it that way. If that’s the case, it’s unlikely that your first thought when you begin a job search will be, “Do the companies I am applying to see me as a leader?” After all, the effort you are making is not about landing a vice president role. But did you know that there is significant consideration given to your leadership ability in the decision to hire you today—despite your “non-management” status?
It’s never too soon to start thinking about how to formulate your interview responses to ensure that your prospective employer knows you’ve thought this through. And, because leadership styles vary so dramatically, it’s also good to start thinking about your own leadership style and how you might develop it further, so that you will be ready to take advantage of future career opportunities when they come your way.
Two interviews in one
After one of my recent seminars at a trade show, I spoke with Steve, a Ph.D. biochemist who’s been going through a number of recent interviews. “I am surprised that I’ve been asked a lot of questions about my relationship with others,” he said to me. “In fact, more emphasis has been placed on this than on skills that fit the requirements of their job. What’s up with this? I’m not applying for a position leading a team of people. I’m applying for jobs that have me doing independent research work at the bench.”
I reminded Steve that, when you interview, you are actually seen as a candidate for two jobs: today’s job—the job you applied for—and the position that would come after that. Hopefully you’ll prepare well for the first, because you’ve seen the job description and have been studying how closely your background might fit the company’s need. It will also probably be pretty easy for the hiring manager to determine whether you fit the bill.
The second role you are applying for, on the other hand, is a much more difficult call for that hiring manager. She needs to think about how you fit into the growth plans that she’s developed for her organization. And it may be more difficult for you to prepare for as well. You’ll have to figure out how to speak about your leadership potential, even if you haven’t had that experience yet. It’s rare to be hired only for talent at the bench; you’ll need to come in with enough people skills to look like you could quickly learn to lead teams or projects.
Different leadership types
Of course, Contract Pharma readers come from a wide variety of career ladders, each with different leadership requirements and opportunities. For the scientist or engineer, leadership of a small research group can often come quickly, especially in startup companies. Perhaps it’s a longer haul for the sales rep to lead a regional or national sales force. But the interesting thing is that in some companies, you don’t have to take on management responsibilities if you don’t want to, because they have a special track for you.
These companies, dual ladder employers, have a formal split between managers, who have direct leadership responsibilities, and those who wish to remain as individual contributors. But even those who decide to stay in the ranks of bench researchers on this dual ladder must practice indirect leadership. Both direct and indirect leadership are important, and recruiters look for candidates who display evidence of either.
Direct leadership is practiced in the classical boss-and-subordinate relationship. You certainly didn’t get this experience in your graduate education; mentoring more junior grad students does not qualify you as being a boss. But you may have supervised others in a job or two outside of school, or perhaps in your present role. In the leadership discussions during an interview, even volunteer activities can be used as evidence of leadership. If you were shift supervisor, for example, you learned how to supervise others on a direct basis. Or, perhaps as a postdoc you had graduate students working for you in the lab. Experiences in delegation and management like these are worth noting. Gather your stories of success like this in preparation for the interview.
While direct leadership experience can be important, especially if you’re interested in pursuing a management position, that other aspect of leadership, the indirect type, is what interviewers will really be hoping to find. This is leadership via influence. Their top candidates always have plenty of this on offer, and it’s an essential ingredient in a company. Here, you may not be the boss, but your expertise in a given area gives you a large impact. Even without being a formal leader in the company, you’ve had ample opportunities to demonstrate this type of leadership. Perhaps the director asked you to review a range of new lab equipment and, after making your recommendation, you were the one trained by the supplier to teach others how to use it properly. That’s a great example of “leadership via influence.”
Examples of leadership don’t need to be tied back to something technical. Perhaps the local chapter of an association like ASM or ACS asked you to find speakers and pull together a successful training event for a new technology. That experience puts you squarely in a leadership role and illustrates to an employer that you are the kind of person who can motivate a group of others to work together on a shared goal. Examples like these can separate you from other jobseekers and earn you the chance to interview in person. This is great ammunition for a cover letter, or to elaborate on in your phone screening interviews.
Different leadership styles
Everyone has a different approach to leadership. In an interview, you may be asked to describe your boss’s approach, the type of leadership you’d respond best to, or perhaps even what kind of leadership you might choose to emulate yourself based on the people you admire. To get you started thinking about these questions, here are a few examples of some leader archetypes, and their associated strengths and weaknesses.
The Parental Leader and the Democratic Leader
It’s easy to spot parental leaders in the ranks. The parental leader will take her reports in hand as a parent would with children, protecting and sheltering them. Unfortunately, the parental leader sets up a climate where employees are dependent upon her, which can slow their own career development. The democratic leader, on the other hand, sounds great at first, because everyone in the lab gets a vote—but in the end, nothing gets done because consensus is often hard to find. While the parental leader needs to cut the apron strings, the democratic leader has to learn to make decisions, because progress is often brought to a halt by a lack of decisive ability.
The Autocratic Leader and the Hands-Off Leader
The autocratic leader has little concern for others and refuses to see them as individuals with unique skills. Instead, to this person, people are tools to get a job done. If you’ve ever had a boss with this attitude, you know it can be a very demoralizing environment, and there is absolutely nothing worth emulating here. In contrast, some leaders feel that their people can do whatever they wish. Working for such a hands-off manager sounds great—until you find that you are way out on a limb because you have so little support. Everyone likes independence, but, as you might have found out if your boss operates in this way, everyone also needs some occasional direction.
The Driven Leader and the Consultative Leader
The driven leader has everyone’s best interests at heart, but manages by imposing his will due to his intense passion. Forceful and objectives-oriented, driven leaders tend to forget that people want to be led, not pushed. The best approach to management that I’ve seen combines this level of passion with a consultative approach. The consultative leader assumes that each individual’s skills are unique and valuable, and decisions are made that reflect the combined intelligence of the team members. This leader consults with them to everyone’s advantage. This approach differs from that of the democratic leader, where everyone gets an equal vote; instead, the consultative leader makes the decision after soliciting everyone’s input. And where a parental manager may give the team a sense of confidence in the leader, the consultative leader gives the team members a sense of confidence in themselves.
A company’s leaders, both direct and indirect, serve as a sort of organizational gyroscope, valued by the company for their ability to establish and maintain internal harmony. It’s never too early to develop your own leadership examples.
David G. Jensen
Contributing Editor
Dave Jensen, President, CTI Executive Search, is an executive recruiter working in the life sciences with more than three decades of biotechnology experience.
He can be reached at (928) 274-2266 or email davejensen@careertrax.com.
It’s never too soon to start thinking about how to formulate your interview responses to ensure that your prospective employer knows you’ve thought this through. And, because leadership styles vary so dramatically, it’s also good to start thinking about your own leadership style and how you might develop it further, so that you will be ready to take advantage of future career opportunities when they come your way.
Two interviews in one
After one of my recent seminars at a trade show, I spoke with Steve, a Ph.D. biochemist who’s been going through a number of recent interviews. “I am surprised that I’ve been asked a lot of questions about my relationship with others,” he said to me. “In fact, more emphasis has been placed on this than on skills that fit the requirements of their job. What’s up with this? I’m not applying for a position leading a team of people. I’m applying for jobs that have me doing independent research work at the bench.”
I reminded Steve that, when you interview, you are actually seen as a candidate for two jobs: today’s job—the job you applied for—and the position that would come after that. Hopefully you’ll prepare well for the first, because you’ve seen the job description and have been studying how closely your background might fit the company’s need. It will also probably be pretty easy for the hiring manager to determine whether you fit the bill.
The second role you are applying for, on the other hand, is a much more difficult call for that hiring manager. She needs to think about how you fit into the growth plans that she’s developed for her organization. And it may be more difficult for you to prepare for as well. You’ll have to figure out how to speak about your leadership potential, even if you haven’t had that experience yet. It’s rare to be hired only for talent at the bench; you’ll need to come in with enough people skills to look like you could quickly learn to lead teams or projects.
Different leadership types
Of course, Contract Pharma readers come from a wide variety of career ladders, each with different leadership requirements and opportunities. For the scientist or engineer, leadership of a small research group can often come quickly, especially in startup companies. Perhaps it’s a longer haul for the sales rep to lead a regional or national sales force. But the interesting thing is that in some companies, you don’t have to take on management responsibilities if you don’t want to, because they have a special track for you.
These companies, dual ladder employers, have a formal split between managers, who have direct leadership responsibilities, and those who wish to remain as individual contributors. But even those who decide to stay in the ranks of bench researchers on this dual ladder must practice indirect leadership. Both direct and indirect leadership are important, and recruiters look for candidates who display evidence of either.
Direct leadership is practiced in the classical boss-and-subordinate relationship. You certainly didn’t get this experience in your graduate education; mentoring more junior grad students does not qualify you as being a boss. But you may have supervised others in a job or two outside of school, or perhaps in your present role. In the leadership discussions during an interview, even volunteer activities can be used as evidence of leadership. If you were shift supervisor, for example, you learned how to supervise others on a direct basis. Or, perhaps as a postdoc you had graduate students working for you in the lab. Experiences in delegation and management like these are worth noting. Gather your stories of success like this in preparation for the interview.
While direct leadership experience can be important, especially if you’re interested in pursuing a management position, that other aspect of leadership, the indirect type, is what interviewers will really be hoping to find. This is leadership via influence. Their top candidates always have plenty of this on offer, and it’s an essential ingredient in a company. Here, you may not be the boss, but your expertise in a given area gives you a large impact. Even without being a formal leader in the company, you’ve had ample opportunities to demonstrate this type of leadership. Perhaps the director asked you to review a range of new lab equipment and, after making your recommendation, you were the one trained by the supplier to teach others how to use it properly. That’s a great example of “leadership via influence.”
Examples of leadership don’t need to be tied back to something technical. Perhaps the local chapter of an association like ASM or ACS asked you to find speakers and pull together a successful training event for a new technology. That experience puts you squarely in a leadership role and illustrates to an employer that you are the kind of person who can motivate a group of others to work together on a shared goal. Examples like these can separate you from other jobseekers and earn you the chance to interview in person. This is great ammunition for a cover letter, or to elaborate on in your phone screening interviews.
Different leadership styles
Everyone has a different approach to leadership. In an interview, you may be asked to describe your boss’s approach, the type of leadership you’d respond best to, or perhaps even what kind of leadership you might choose to emulate yourself based on the people you admire. To get you started thinking about these questions, here are a few examples of some leader archetypes, and their associated strengths and weaknesses.
The Parental Leader and the Democratic Leader
It’s easy to spot parental leaders in the ranks. The parental leader will take her reports in hand as a parent would with children, protecting and sheltering them. Unfortunately, the parental leader sets up a climate where employees are dependent upon her, which can slow their own career development. The democratic leader, on the other hand, sounds great at first, because everyone in the lab gets a vote—but in the end, nothing gets done because consensus is often hard to find. While the parental leader needs to cut the apron strings, the democratic leader has to learn to make decisions, because progress is often brought to a halt by a lack of decisive ability.
The Autocratic Leader and the Hands-Off Leader
The autocratic leader has little concern for others and refuses to see them as individuals with unique skills. Instead, to this person, people are tools to get a job done. If you’ve ever had a boss with this attitude, you know it can be a very demoralizing environment, and there is absolutely nothing worth emulating here. In contrast, some leaders feel that their people can do whatever they wish. Working for such a hands-off manager sounds great—until you find that you are way out on a limb because you have so little support. Everyone likes independence, but, as you might have found out if your boss operates in this way, everyone also needs some occasional direction.
The Driven Leader and the Consultative Leader
The driven leader has everyone’s best interests at heart, but manages by imposing his will due to his intense passion. Forceful and objectives-oriented, driven leaders tend to forget that people want to be led, not pushed. The best approach to management that I’ve seen combines this level of passion with a consultative approach. The consultative leader assumes that each individual’s skills are unique and valuable, and decisions are made that reflect the combined intelligence of the team members. This leader consults with them to everyone’s advantage. This approach differs from that of the democratic leader, where everyone gets an equal vote; instead, the consultative leader makes the decision after soliciting everyone’s input. And where a parental manager may give the team a sense of confidence in the leader, the consultative leader gives the team members a sense of confidence in themselves.
A company’s leaders, both direct and indirect, serve as a sort of organizational gyroscope, valued by the company for their ability to establish and maintain internal harmony. It’s never too early to develop your own leadership examples.
David G. Jensen
Contributing Editor
Dave Jensen, President, CTI Executive Search, is an executive recruiter working in the life sciences with more than three decades of biotechnology experience.
He can be reached at (928) 274-2266 or email davejensen@careertrax.com.