Have you ever been excited to work with someone you admired? Maybe you have seen this person in action or have heard about their great ideas and you thought “I want to work with him or her.” A door opens and you are asked to join the team. Over the next several weeks you notice you’re feeling overwhelmed and under-valued. In fact, you are wondering why you ever wanted to work with this person.
Is your new leader a multiplier or a diminisher? According to Liz Wiseman, author of the Multipliers: How The Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter and the Multiplier Effect, there are two types of leaders: multipliers and diminishers.
Multipliers amplify the smarts and capabilities of the people around them. As leaders, multipliers inspire us to go farther, achieve more and surpass expectations. However, diminishers stifle the creative flow, inhibit growth, and drain energy.
Bono said “It has been said that after meeting with the great British Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone, you left feeling he was the smartest person in the world, but after meeting with his rival Benjamin Disraeli, you left thinking you were the smartest person.” Based on her research, Wiseman identified five disciplines which differentiate multipliers from diminishers.
Multipliers | Diminishers |
| Talent Finder – Attract and optimize talent | Gatekeeper – Underutilize talent |
| Liberator – Requires best thinking | Tyrant – Suppresses thinking |
| Challenger – Seeding opportunities for others | Know It-All – Showcase their knowledge |
| Community Builder- Constructs debate to drive decisions | Decision Maker – Centralize decision making |
| Investor – Instills ownership and accountability | Micromanager – Manages all actions |
According to Maxwell’s Law of Explosive Growth, to grow your organization exponentially, leaders must develop leaders. Multipliers achieve 2.3x the results because they operate from a base of “people are smart and will figure it out” (Wiseman). “Leadership development compounds. The more you invest in people and longer you do it, the greater the growth and the higher the return” (Maxwell).
If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader”
– John Quincy Adams
As you reflect on your leadership style ask yourself; are you a multiplier or diminisher?
God bless,
Kim