Transition Technical Experts to Leadership Roles

© 2004 www.NextPhaseLeadership.com Dr. S. Brett Savage Page 1
We Clone Your Best Leaders
Transitioning Leaders to Higher Contribution
By: Dr. S. Brett Savage
President and CEO
Next Phase Leadership
Do you want to know what the biggest complaint is that most of our corporate clients have
when working with technical people on complex change projects? It’s the narrow tactical view
they have and their even narrower abilities to influence others, to see the “big picture” or employ
sound people skills. Not all technical professionals are like this of course – there certainly are
exceptions – but think of your own experience. When was the last time you tried to fit all the
pieces together to solve a complex, broad, ambiguous, multifaceted business problem only to
keep bumping up against a few people on the team who had the same answer for almost every
Issue—their mantra of narrow technology based solutions?
In reality, it’s been this way for centuries, with these issues manifest in a variety of
historical texts. In Greek mythology, Procrustes was a roadside bandit (a technical expert of his
day), who tortured each passerby (his clients) by making them lie down in a special bed he
provided. When they did so, he either stretched them out or cut off body parts to make them
“fit” into his torturous technological solution. This Procrustean “one size fits all” approach is the
kind of torture that occurs when technical professionals cannot escape their own narrow view of
the larger business world. While this narrow approach often works well on focused technical
assignments, it often creates significant problems for those charged with developing broader
business solutions. In particular, the torture imposed by managers and technical leaders who
take this “technical expert” approach is painful to those they work with and sooner or later short-
circuits the broader goals of the overall organization.
What company leaders need in order to solve these oft repeated problems are proven
research-based tools and a way of thinking that provides an approach to help selected individual
contributors (IC’s) transition out of their narrow world and into broader leadership roles (perhaps
management), so they can meet the broader needs of the organization. Without a reliable model
(pertinent training, assessment, follow up coaching and ROI accountability), they’re doomed to
loose sleep in the Procrustean bed. Without research-based data and the right transition tools
this Transition to Leadership™, mournfully boasts failure rates as high as 84%. When leaders
fail to make the “Transition to Leadership”, the talents of the entire team are undermined,

© 2015 www.NextPhaseLeadership.com
communication falls apart and the needs of internal/external clients are not fully satisfied. When
these problems occur the list of business failures goes on ad infinitum.
The Phases of Performance and Contribution™
The research derived model that best addresses this critical Transition to Leadership was
originally developed at Harvard by Gene Dalton PhD and Paul Thompson PhD.1
Their multi-year
study of professionals in several large organizations, found that the highest contributors in each
organization successfully “transitioned” through at least two, and sometimes three, different
Phases of Performance and ContributionTM
, over the life-course of their careers. Their success
was based on this critical difference between contribution and performance: performance is
what you “do”, while contribution is the impact or difference your performance makes on
business results. You need to measure both! You need to know what the contribution ranking of
your entire organization is in order to have a clear picture of what you can and cannot
accomplish. In the end, it’s not just how well your employees and managers are performing
(though that’s one good measure), but also how well they’re contributing to the overall outcomes
of the business.
The crucial insight from the Harvard study – reinforced by the more recent Multi-Industry
Global Phases Research conducted by Next Phase Leadership in 2006-14 – reveals that high
performance and contribution fundamentally change when a person moves from one Phase to
another. In essence, the approach, attitude, relationships, identity and skill sets that make an
individual successful in one Phase virtually guarantee their failure in the next Phase of
professional contribution. In order to be successful, individuals must undergo a transition that
requires a change in perspective, attitude, identity, scope of assignments, politics, EQ
(Emotional Intelligence), relationships/networks and the acquisition of basic skills. Next Phase
Leadership Global Phases Research further discovered that these transitions are difficult to
make. The actual steps are counter-intuitive, not helped along by IQ, age, educational degree,
most kinds of training, prior experience, or a person’s movement into a new position (i.e.. being
promoted without making the critical transition to the right Phase creates far more problems than
it solves). Indeed, data show that promoted professionals who do not successfully make the
transition from individual contribution (IC’s in Phase 2) to Supervisor/Manager (Phase 3), can
bring down an entire function. Ironically, recent research demonstrates that some very special
individuals get pinned in-between Phase 2 and 3 and can actually stay there for years making
valuable contributions in Phase 2.5. The stress level for these “tweeners” is high being
stretched between two worlds. But, instant communications technology, small spans of
influence, ample resources, focused technical projects and intense management support seem
to protect them from failure. It must be stated that these Phase 2.5 folks are rare cases that
require close support or they burn up fast! Many move to Phase 3 after about 4 years.
Phase 1 Phase 2
Phase 4
Phase 3

Moreover, the most crucial of these transitions is the huge leap from an individual
contributor (IC) role (or Phase 2) to that of manager or informal leader (Phase 3). In
fact, Next Phase Leadership Global Phases Research shows that at least 81% of
professionals never fully understand or master the changing expectations, shift in their
identity, new skills, use of politics, grasp of strategy and formation of relationships to
transition to Phase 3, and thus fail to make this most business-critical transition. Sadly,
these bright professionals find themselves hopelessly stuck in the wrong Phase (and/or
position) and can quickly experience declining morale, misaligned teamwork and
plummeting professional contribution. These once-engaged folks often burn out trying to
do two jobs at once, and failing at both, leave the company. The company suffers the
double loss of a leading technical person and a potential leader. If others follow them
out the door it can be devastating. (For a more complete review of the implications of the
Global Phases Research project/outcomes please contact us at www.NextPhaseLeadership.com).
A Huge Problem
When a management or leadership (Phase 3) role opens up, very often the most
qualified technical person (in Phase 2) is selected to fill the job. The logic behind this
selection process seems intuitive and valid – except it’s neither! When you take smart
experienced people who have mastered some narrow area of technical expertise and
plop them down in a position that requires them to think broadly, abandon their “expert
style”, manage processes and people, coach and develop others, guide and coordinate
cross-functional efforts, plan the work of the team, connect the implications of the
team’s work with key stakeholders, etc., it can be disastrous! It stands to reason, goes
the conventional logic, that the best technical expert will make the best technical leader,
right? While this approach seems to make sense, it almost never works! Let’s say it
again: it almost never works!
Promoting high-performing technically-minded individual contributors (IC’s) to
management or leadership roles, when they haven’t already begun to master the
necessary transition skills, is like attaching weights to a long distance swimmer. They
can stay afloat for a while using sheer strength, but they won’t last through the long
haul. As soon as the “glow of promotion” wears off, (usually a couple of days), they
begin to sink under the weight of added responsibilities that cannot be addressed using
their well-practiced individual contributor (Phase 2) mindset. Do you hear the crashing
sound yet?
The Transition Dilemma: From Depth to Breadth
The problem of transitioning technical folks to management/leadership positions
can be solved! Unfortunately, most companies/professionals don’t know the subtle
specifics of how to make The Transition to Leadership work for them. The most
common approach is to take the newly-promoted manager/leader and run them through
skills training. Wrong! Well sort of. Here’s why.

The skills acquisition approach often happens at the wrong time (post promotion),
with the wrong group (individuals with individual contributor mindsets), and then sends
the wrong message (learning management (meaning behavioral) skills makes you a
manager). Trying to teach: enterprise thinking; cross-vertical alignment and
coordination, team building, delegation, project planning, performance management,
strategic alignment, coaching skills, and an “us” mentality, to people who just got
promoted for their exceptional technical “me” expertise is potentially doomed. The
timing’s wrong! Management skills just don’t stick to Teflon-coated technicians.
Linda Hill, another Harvard professor who completed a landmark study on this
transition from individual contributor (Phase2) to manager (Phase 3), made a similar
observation as our research shows in her book, Becoming a Manager.
“Listening to managers, it becomes clear that the transition to
manager is not limited to acquiring competencies and building
relationships. Rather, it constitutes a profound transformation, as
managers learn to think, feel and value as managers.”2
Individual contributors must make this profound transformation or what Next Phase
Leadership research has identified as a “psycho-social-shift” or “change of heart” (as
many claim) by: changing their perspective and approach from one of vertical/depth to
enterprise/breadth; changing their professional identity from “me” to “we”; changing how
they “see” their relationships—from being a “peer” to one who must exercise
influence/power; and moving their focus from tactics and technology to people,
processes and broader business outcomes.
Making this psycho-social-shift (seeing self and others differently), requires an
understanding of the subtleties and specifics of making, what we call, “The Transition to
Leadership.” Making a successful transition begins with a very specific assessment of
the Phase the person is operating in and then outlining the behaviors, perspectives and
activities that need to be systematically abandoned, altered and augmented.
Additionally, they must be given the right tools and coaching to track the progress of
their transition over time.
Only after an individual has created and successfully implemented a “transition
plan” and begun to abandon their Phase 2 perspectives can the needed management
skills and broad perspectives begin to sink in and make sense. The hardest part of
becoming Phase 3 is not learning to become Phase 3 but learning how to “unbecome”
the Phase 2 professional one has been for perhaps decades. If the professional will not
or cannot let go of their Phase 2 love affair, it’s like putting socks on a cat: it can still
walk, but looks comical at best and ridiculous at worst! If The Transition to higher
contribution (Phase 2 to Phase 3) were easy, 84% of persons wouldn’t fail at it! Sadly,
too many organizations just toss their hands in the air and accept the dismal damage
these Phase 2 managers create. The attitude is often, “we can’t demote them after all
the training and money we’ve spent on them. It would make us look like we don’t know
what we’re doing!” You probably don’t.

Why Don’t We See It?
Most companies fail to see the importance of these transitions, in large part,
because companies don’t go into business to be companies. They go into business to
make profits by providing products and/or services that people want or need. The fact is
that forming a large company requires the development of a complex social structure
with different roles, relationships and responsibilities. Bringing people together in this
social structure is the necessary, but by no means sufficient, process required to
accomplish the desired business results. The roles, relationships, assessments, skills,
role transitions, responsibilities, “intangibles” and how they change over time to create
successful complex social structures called “companies” is the very heart of Next Phase
Leadership’s mission and expertise. The pressure for corporations to focus on tangible
profits often eclipses the reality of these intangibles, which define the crucial transitions
managers must make to be able to lead and motivate others and deliver sustainable
profitability. Ironic isn’t it?
How Big Is the Problem?
How important is it that organizations help their talented technical professionals to
make this critical transition to manager? In her book, Linda Hill noted: “The human and
financial costs are staggering for both the organization and those who fail to make the
transition to manager.”3
How significant is this problem in Corporate America? In our recent Global Study
of Fortune 500 companies, Next Phase Leadership found that 63% of all managers are
primarily operating as individual contributors4
with fancy
titles and pay that overestimates their actual contribution.
Approximately 21% of all managers are “stuck” somewhere
in the transition to manager and are making little or no
forward progress. Some are able to maintain their sanity as
they straddle-the-fence and contribute as Phase 2.5
professionals; others are not so lucky at having a foot in
both worlds. Dr. Hill’s study and our own data at Next
Phase Leadership tells us that the transition usually takes 5
to 7 years to complete even when the individual gets
consistent and significant help along the way…and few get
that help!
Our research also shows that an individual contributor who fully transitions into the
role of a Phase 3 manager or Phase 3 non-manager can triple his/her team’s
contribution to the organization. Indeed, the 1% of your managers who might be solid
Phase 3 players (remember you might have no one in Phase 3 and yet need at least
6%), are always calibrated in the highest ranked position at the 90th
percentile or above!
There has not been even one exception to this ranking in the last 6 years! If 84% of all
managers in today’s organizations have not yet fully transitioned to the role of Phase 3
manager even the most conservative calculation of “lost opportunity” costs would be
frightening!
Phase 1
Phase 2
Phase 4
Phase 3

Making “The Transition” is the Solution
Consider the experience of a long-term manager we worked with who caught the
vision and started to make the transition. Doug had been a manager for almost 15 years
at a large R&D facility. He loved his “scientific solo act,” and though he liked the perks
and pay that came with “management,” he acknowledged that he had never really
managed anything or anyone. He was a Phase 2 individual contributor, heart, body and
soul, but was only “impersonating a manager” as he put it.
After going through our training, Doug accepted the challenge to think, act, and
value people and the business like a Phase 3 manager. His assignment from the
training session was to take on a project important and complex enough to require his
assembling a team of specialists in order for it to succeed. He was to bring this team
together, sell them on the project, get their input on how to do it, beg, borrow and steal
the needed resources from somewhere, get upper management support, and
coordinate all these efforts to achieve the desired results and report the results of the
project by giving all the credit to his team. As part of his assignment, Doug was not
allowed to do any of the technical work himself. The thought of not being the technical
expert about killed him!
With the encouragement and support of his boss, and the constant “nagging” and
incremental assessments from his Next Phase Leadership Coach, Doug jumped into
the project. Six months later, we met with the same group of managers who had had
gone through Next Phase Leadership’s “Transition” training with Doug and were given
the same type of Phase 3 “transition assignments”. When we asked for a volunteer from
this group to share just one success story, Doug jumped up, very uncharacteristically
and said,
“I don’t have a story, I have three.” Knowing Doug, we all cringed a little,
wondering what he would say, but his first story really captured our interest. He
described going to one of his direct reports and asking her if she was doing the kind of
work she was best suited for. After getting over her surprise—Doug had never asked
anyone this question before—she suggested that she was capable of much more. She
had been taking programming courses as part of earning a degree in night school and
had developed proficiency in the latest programming language.
Coincidentally, Doug’s project required his junior colleague’s newly developed
expertise. With her on board as the programmer, Doug assembled a group of
professionals from other parts of the lab to provide the expertise for the other
technologies that were required. He was surprised at how straightforward this was. “All I
had to do was ask for help, something I had not done before,” he told us at the reporting
meeting.
Doug’s team delivered the final product to the client three weeks early and
$80,000 under budget. Equally important, he gave all the credit to and publically praised
his team members. These results both surprised and impressed his boss. Doug told us
that he was now motivated to complete his transition to being a fully functioning Phase 3
manager. “Since the project was completed,” he added," two other tenured scientists
have come to my office asking to work with me on my next big project. I already have
them involved in tackling some pretty complex technical issues.” He concluded by
saying, “What’s odd is that in 15 years as a manager, no one has ever come to me
asking for more work nor for my help and coaching. Now there’s a line forming at my
door.”

Stories like these are not at all unusual. In many cases the transitioning of people into
Phase 3 creates even more significant results. All told, the transition into Phase 3 not
only leverages the capabilities and commitment of the person making the transition—it
simultaneously grows the capabilities of others while adding to your bottom line.
Individuals more than pay for the investment you make in them when they make the
transition to Phase 3. Indeed, in just one instance with one of our Reinsurance clients in
Connecticut, a single individual’s “Phase 3 transition project” netted the company 3
times what it had spent on their entire leadership development program for 3 years. I’m
not even going to say, do the math.
The 3-Step Transition Process (increases your manager/leadership development
success rate by 200%)
There is a 3-step process which includes; specialized training, research-based
assessment tools, Phase-Coaching and developing 10 critical Transition Skills that can
help even the most experienced managers, many still chained to their Phase 2
shackles, make the transition into Phase 3 and grow your business perhaps
exponentially. The process outline is:
Step 1. Transition Training First, all your supervisors, managers (and your
pool of “Hypo’s” you hope will one day succeed as managers), need brief
specialized training on how to understand and make “the Transition” out of
Phase 2 into Phase 3. Because it’s not intuitive, they need to clearly understand
what the Transition looks like for each of them individually. They need to know
how to make the shift in identity, perspective, capabilities and take on a
fundamentally new approach to the work required to fully complete the transition
more quickly (most take 7-12 years, we can reduce it to 18 months…do the
math!). Each participant prepares a personalized Phase 3 Transition Plan™ to
focus his/her development efforts and keep their transition/development on track.
Our proprietary research-based “Phases Assessment Tool” is used, in-class, to
pinpoint and then track the individual’s transition into the manager/leader role
over a period of 9-12 months following Next Phase training. This assessment
helps to ensure that their development gets started off on the right foot, pinpoints
their needed transition capabilities and this then follows them all the way through
their Transition.
Step 2. Phase-Coaching and Results Accountability Next, your managers-in-
transition need their “feet held to the Phase 3 fire” by receiving a minimum of 9-
months Phase-Coaching (12 is better), so they can be specifically guided,
regularly corrected, recognized, rewarded and held accountable for their
development progress and business results. It’s not hard to recognize their
contribution since the results are designed to be significant and visible to others!
During the transition process our Phase-Coaches use our fast (3-4 questions),
proprietary Micro-SurveysTM
(a mini-360 degree feedback tool), to quarterly
assess their protégés transition successes and leveraged business results. It’s
smooth, simple, reliable and measures the ROI you’re looking for.

Step 3. Phase 3 Skills After the transition process has scraped off some of the
“technical Teflon,” the actual skills associated with being Phase 3 can now “stick”
to your managers. Well within the Transition, your managers are now ready to
receive the critical “Phase 3 skills” associated with the leveraged business
results and higher contribution in Phase 3. Here’s a brief outline of what they
learn in our skills classes:
1. Emotional Intelligence: Caring, Curiosity, and Real Human Connections
2. Coaching to Increase Contribution: initiative, growth and engagement
3. Networking: Building & maintaining business relationships
4. Receiving Feedback: Being an example for others, gaining trust & critical information
5. Retaining Top Talent: Maximizing employee growth and retention
6. Giving Feedback: Providing feedback that changes attitudes and behaviors
7. Developing Bench Strength: Build the team, grow results
8. Projects and Planning: Achieving better aligned results
9. Contribution/Performance Reviews: Make it all meaningful, worthwhile, reduce
anxiety, measure value, encourage long term value
10. When Things Go Terribly Wrong: Healing the blame & bitterness that kills business
When this process is followed, individuals who are “managers-in-title-only” complete the
transition to becoming fully functioning Phase 3 contributors (or they voluntarily opt out
which prevents a multitude of other problems). In the process, they often realize higher
personal job satisfaction, team engagement, develop greater bench strength for your
business, build a much broader network of support and information coordination and
can deliver anywhere from 30 to 200% increased business results!
Next Phase Leadership has the capability to perform the up front “Contribution/Phases
Research” in your organization to identify your high potentials, to execute your;
succession planning and leadership development needs and do it quicker and more
effectively than traditional fire-and-forget training. Our partners are positioned around
the world to assist in the 3-Step process.
Number of Facilitators and Locations:
USA/Canada 7 Facilitators/Coaches (English/French)
Europe 3 Facilitators/Coaches (German, Danish, French)
Brazil 2 Facilitators/Coaches (Portuguese, Spanish, English)
Singapore 2 Facilitators/Coaches (Mandarin/Cantonese/)
India 7 Facilitators/Coaches (12 languages and English)

Putting Procrustes to Bed
The transition to Phase 3 manager or leader is one of the most difficult challenges
a professional will face in his/her career. The good news is that with the right kind of
help and support, the number of professionals who fully complete this transition can be
significantly increased in any organization (from 84% failure to 67% success). In
addition, the time it takes to complete the transition can be reduced 200%. In the
process, we can “put-to-bed” the typical Procrustean approach to bad promotions for
the benefit of everyone involved. Let us “clone” your best leaders/managers and see
everything get better in your organization.
Dr. Savage is President and CEO of Next Phase Leadership LLC, a global
research-based training and consulting firm that focuses on providing proven
solutions to grow and develop technical professionals within role and to help
others make “the Treacherous Transition” into much higher contributing
leadership positions/roles. drsbrettsavage@gmail.com
Endnotes
1. Gene W. Dalton, Paul H. Thompson and Ray Price, “The Four Stages of Professional
Careers,” Organizational Dynamics (Summer 1977), pp. 19-42.
2. Linda A. Hill, Becoming a Manager: How New Managers Master the Challenges of
Leadership, Penguin Books, 1993.
3. Ibid.
4. Next Phase Leadership Global Phases Research, conducted from 2003-2013. The most
recent data from a Fortune 500 Company, July 2013. Data made available within specific
marketing/sales interventions and consulting/training under contract. All Rights Reserved.

Appendix, Leadership Outcome Studies
Next Phase Leadership’s global research, plus 20+ years of experience, provides
solutions to the never ending succession planning and leadership development game.
Here are some outcome studies of interest. Here’s the problem:
ü 84% of all managers/supervisors (in their first 2 years in role) are still stuck in Phase 2
ü 69% of upper level managers are in Phase 2
ü 49% of all Director level leaders are in Phase 2
ü 34% of VP’s are in Phase 2.3 (should be solid Phase 3)
ü 9% of C-Suite level leaders are in Phase 2.5 (they should be Phase 3.5)
Transition Training With 12-months of Phase Coaching: (here’s the solutions)
1. Increases the Transition Success Rate 200% over non-Phase-Coached participants
2. Decreases Manager Transition times by 3-7 years
3. Increases managers Ranked Contributions by 20-45 percentile points
4. Increases all Phase 2 Contributors Value by an average of 12 percentile points
5. NPL has a 64% Phase 2 Manager Remediation Rate.
6. In successful Transitions, teams can recognize a 10 to 200+% Net Profitability Increase
7. Companies realize a 17-44% Increase in their Employee Engagement and Satisfaction
8. Top Talent Attraction Scores Improve by 10-30% with a 6% Phase 3 Manager population
9. Leadership Skills acquisition and use increases by as much as 200% over non-Phase 3’s
taking leadership skills training
10.Phase-Coached managers average 300% annual ROI above the price of their Coaching
11.Employee commitment scores increase an average of 20 percentile points when they have
a Phase 3 leader in their organization (does not even have to be their direct boss)
12.In one recent NPL study in New York, the net profitable ROI from just one leader in a
group of 40 transition trained leaders who made the full transition to Phase 3 in 24 months
paid for the company’s entire leadership training budget for the previous two years (over
$421,000.00 USD).
13.Leaders who have transitioned to Phase 3 demand greater efficiency and effective
coordination between all groups in their business and report cross-functional
communication scores improve by 60%
14.Retention of “top talent” increases 300% in groups with managers in Phase 2.6 or above
15.Succession Planning and leadership development are linked together seamlessly
16.

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