Own Your Leadership Seat at the Table
Photo by CHUTTERSNAP on Unsplash
Do you often wish that you could have a seat at the leadership table and listen to or be a part of the important conversations? That you’re missing out on something crucial because you’re lacking that seat. It reminds me of the Hamilton song where Aaron Burr craves being in the center of leadership with Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton. Burr mournfully sings:
No one really knows how the game is played
The art of the trade
How the sausage gets made
We just assume that it happens…
I wanna be in the room where it happens (I’ve got to be, I’ve got to be)
This is a feeling that many of us can relate to. It can feel that there’s yet another table that’s agonizingly out of reach, whether it’s a key leadership meeting, a C-suite powwow, or the board meeting. We’ve all been there. And sometimes, frustratingly, that’s not the most healthy or helpful thing to focus on.
What’s in your control is how you show up in the rooms that you’re already a part of. And how you show up is going to impact and affect the likelihood of an invitation to the bigger rooms.
Consider these 4 lessons as a reminder on how to own your seat at the table:
1. The dinner party metaphor: understand your patterns and habits
Think about a setting that you’re already familiar with, a dinner party. Take your mind back to those pre-pandemic times and remember some of the best dinner parties that you’ve attended. Consider the role that you typically play. Do any of these sound familiar?
The host who has assembled this group of unique individuals
The chef (or Grubhub account holder) who’s chosen the menu
The storyteller who entertains with witty anecdotes
The connector who draws everyone into the experience
The jester who adds lightness to the conversation
The appreciator who brings a sense of grace and gratitude to the gathering
At the dinner party, there are no silent observers —everybody plays a role. It’s not enough to simply want to be in the room “just to listen and gain context.” That’s not offering up additional value.
Instead, think about what patterns from a dinner party you could bring into the different tables (or meetings) at work. For each of these meetings, take a discerning look, imagine yourself at that leadership table, and intentionally decide what role you want to be playing. It might be a habitual role. It might be a new one. Your choice.
Consider your limiting habits and intentionally make a choice on the role to play at the leadership table.
2. Remember your unique strengths and values
It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that you’re the least powerful person in the room. It might be true in terms of title, however, that won’t help your confidence or state of ownership at the table. Instead, think about your unique strengths. You might bring in skillsets from your discipline or a way of processing information. For example, you might be:
A quieter introvert who can observe the flow of discussion and then ask a key question to reshape the room’s thinking
A researcher who can quickly bring in data or user observations that build upon the topics discussed
A person who slowly processes and assimilates the info and can then summarize the chaotic discussion that’s been happening
An engineer who can quickly estimate the cost and time of building that feature
Consider what unique strengths you bring into the table. How might that align with your overall values for what change or mission you’d like to play at the organization?
One of my clients is a product architect with an engineering background. He has the unique ability to see the long-term product vision, the technical background to understand the feasibility of each suggestion, and the curiosity to keep questioning the value of executing on purely tactical or iterative tasks. His unique strength is balancing the big picture against the short-term iterative roadmap. That’s what brings him the most energy and state of flow at work. That’s his unique strength to bring to each leadership table.
One of my wisest bosses would constantly remind the design teams that we were the only people in the company who could produce pixels and prototypes to bring that product vision to life. From that place of strength, one role of the designer is to create the artifacts that shape the dinner party conversation.
Spend a little bit of time brainstorming your unique strengths and values, then consider how they can support your role at the table.
3. Those stories in your head: are they fact or fiction?
And yet, we may still feel that we don’t belong. That everyone else has a higher title, or more knowledge, or more experience than we have. I’ve heard many people share these stories. I don’t want to speak up or my idea won’t work because…
… I’m the lowest power position in the room
… I’m not as close to what the customer support team does
… I don’t know what’s been discussed at the board-level
… I haven’t seen the latest feedback from customers
We all have these stories in our head that prevent us from owning our seat at the table. Know that these artifacts of imposter syndrome are normal, we all do this. Recognize that these are stories that we tell ourself and that they might be limiting our leadership. Pause for a minute, and ask yourself a question: is this story fact or fiction? If there’s even a small percentage of it that might be fiction, then perhaps you do speak up or ask a question.
4. Less naval-gazing, more action
It can be really easy to get lost in our thoughts and stories. We can complain to our work besties that no one will give us that seat at the table. But if we do that, it’s unlikely that anything will change.
Instead, pick one small action or experiment to try differently to own your seat at the table. Look at a meeting that you’re already a part of. Actively choose to play a different role in that meeting. Try it and see what it feels like.
Bottom-Line
We all feel that we want to be admitted into the room where it happens. Yet we can so often discount the current rooms where we belong. Use these rooms as spaces for experimentation. Take your seat at the table and own it by choosing a role to play which leverages your unique strengths.