You have created the Plan for the upcoming project. Plan A. It’s detailed, filled with all the information your team needs to complete the project successfully. You’ve listed all the criteria. You’ve covered every possible thing that could go wrong and detailed how to overcome them. The plan is solid.
You’ve also created Plan B, just in case Plan A is not sufficient. Plan B covers the things Plan A forgot about, and brings together everything the success of the project needs.
And right now? It’s getting very late, and you are just putting the finishing touches to Plan C, the one which covers the eventualities nobody ever asked for, the scenarios which will never happen. And if you are honest with yourself, you aren’t even sure yourself why you are creating Plan C.
But the plan is now complete. You’ve finished it, and you feel that wave of relief washing over you, the satisfaction of the knowledge that you have done what is needed.
The only problem is, before you’ve even shut down your laptop, that feeling of relief has already evaporated, and something else which needs to be covered is presenting itself…
The Plan Was Finished Hours Ago
Preparation is essential, let’s make no mistake about it. It’s in the famous “6 P’s” – proper prior preparation prevents poor performance.
And you are very good at preparation, people rely upon you for it – your team, your bosses, your customers, they have all knowingly benefitted from your thorough preparation. Everyone can think of examples of time where things went wrong and projects were derailed precisely because of something which nobody had planned for – your projects don’t do that because of your preparation.
However, somewhere along the line, at some point which you never noticed, all that planning and preparation stopped serving the projects. The preparation was complete by Plan B. Plan C, that was about something else.
At the root of it is a thought. A thought which you’ve probably never verbalised, but which runs much of your working day.
“If I plan hard enough, then nothing can go wrong.”
Sounds familiar, doesn’t it!
The thought itself brings with it a sort of steady, low-level pressure which is always there; in meetings, at dinner, and late at night when you are revising Plan D because you’ve thought of another scenario even though all the existing plans more than cover everything.
Like most people, you probably put that hum down to the role – it’s just part of the job, it’s simply “being responsible”.
However, the reality is that it has rather less to do with actually leading than you might like to think…
Holding Direction, or Holding Every Thread?
There is an important distinction we need to make here, the distinction between leadership and control.
They often feel like two sides of the same coin, but the reality is that they are two very different things, and mixing the two together is what got you into this situation.
Leadership is all about direction. It’s about where you are all going, about what is important and what isn’t, about what matters, and about knowing what the priorities are when it comes to making choices and decisions. Nudging details when required to create the big picture.
Control, on the other hand, tries to hold on to every single thing. It tries to manage every individual task, from big to small. It tries to hold every possible contingency. Control means that nothing can be permitted to happen without you knowing about it first, because it is important that nothing catches you out. Which sounds laudable, until you realise it makes you the bottleneck, it makes you the weakest link, and it ultimately burns you out (and, if you notice, burns your team out too).
How can you tell the difference between the two? After all, they seem very similar in their aim.
The amount of detail tells you very little. What matters is what the detail is for.
Ask yourself “Who is this plan for?”
If the work absolutely needs it, then that’s leadership.
But if others already have that taken care of, if the work would be just as good without that plan but you feel that you need the plan to feel good? That’s control, not leadership.
Think of the last plan you made. How many of its contingencies where there for the actual work?
Why Asking Feels Like Admitting Something
Have you ever found yourself in this sort of situation? You are facing a tricky question. You know exactly who could answer it, a colleague who knows this topic far better than you do, a colleague you could easily message and have an answer in minutes.
But instead of asking them, you spend the evening building yet another version of that spreadsheet by yourself in order to figure out the answer.
you tell yourself that you are doing this because you are able to and that you can work it out, all of which is true to a certain extent, even though it costs you hours.
However, the real reason you do it is much harder to admit – asking would mean that something wasn’t complete, and that even after all your preparation there was a gap. Worse than that, the moment that you ask someone else, you show that gap exists and others now know it!
So instead of asking, you spend hours late into the evening closing the gap yourself – what a waste, when you look at it.
It the same reluctance which makes it so hard, or even impossible, for you to admit “I’m not sure” in a meeting, even though that’s sometimes the best answer someone can give.
Notice, too, who ultimately pays for this hesitation and reluctance. You do. With the late night work, the extra hours, the time spent doing this when you could be more productively attending to something else. And all because only you can be the one who hold the whole plan, you must be the one in control, nobody else is allowed to see the parts still being worked out.
Which is precisely why the plan never quite feels finished…
Preparation Has A Finish Line
A vital difference between preparation and control is that preparation produces something which can be finished. A piece of work which can be seen to be complete, done, ready to move on.
Control, however, only ever produces a feeling, a feeling of being safe from being caught out. Worse, that feeling is fleeting, it only lasts while you are watching. Which is why you feel the need to keep producing plan after plan after plan.
Worse than that is who or what gets the credit when things work out. It’s not you who gets the credit, it’s the planning. It worked because of all the planning, therefore you must keep doing more and more planning. Even though most of the time that planning was irrelevant and the thing would have worked perfectly well without most of it anyway.
So What Now?
Which of your backup plans exists for the work, and which exists so that nobody could ever say you hadn’t thought of it?
If you fancy going into much more depth about this, and finding some powerful answers, then check out “Leading Without Losing Yourself“, which is part of The Overachievers Club – it’s a course of 8 modules about the gap between you and the version of you who leads, what that costs, and leading with your own judgement and humour back in place.
On the other hand, if you prefer something a little more relaxed and fun, take The Overachiever Quiz – 10 fun questions to find out what kind of overachiever you are, and what to do with that information.
Connected Podcast Episode
In the accompanying episode, we look at what happened when one leader finally took a fortnight off, and why she came back more tired than she left.
Episode 038 – Leading Without Pressure
Still checking your inbox on holiday, even when nothing needs you? Discover why leadership and control feel the same, and what the grip costs you.
Relevant Related Blogs and Episodes
Pressure Is Learned, Not Inherent
Pressure can drive results, but it doesn’t have to be permanent. A thoughtful look at overachieving, conditioning, and sustainable performance.
Episode 037 – The Role and the Person
Did you decide who to be at work in your first fortnight, then never look again? Discover why early guesses in a role stick, and how to review them.
