TechServe Alliance Archives

Key Takeaways Your best producer and your best future leader are rarely the same person, since individual performance and leadership potential draw on different skills. Leadership success shifts from what you personally accomplish to what your team accomplishes because of you. Listening to understand beats listening to respond. People often need better questions and space to think, not immediate answers. Leaders create the opportunities. Growth still depends on what people do with them, and that follow through is worth noticing and rewarding. As AI takes over more tasks, discernment becomes the leadership skill that matters most: knowing which answers actually matter. Clarity on the outcome, not the steps, is what lets people take real ownership. Organizations scale by building leadership at every level, not by routing every decision through a handful of exceptional people. Reflections on TechServe Alliance's Leadership in Action: Building Teams That Scale I've been fortunate to learn from a lot of great leaders throughout my career in staffing. Some have led through coaching me. Some have challenged me and pushed me in ways I didn’t know I needed at the time. Others by simply leading in a way that made me want to be better. And sometimes, it's a single sentence in a conversation or webinar that stays with you long after it's over. That happened during TechServe Alliance's recent Leadership in Action: Building Teams That Scale panel, moderated by Barb Bruno and featuring Kevin Krumm (Objective Partners), Katie Breault (YUPRO Placement), and Robert Bouchard (Tier4Group). One of the reasons I was especially looking forward to this discussion was because I already knew the caliber of leaders on the panel. Kevin Krumm is one of my former leaders, I’ve seen Katie’s leadership in action at YUPRO and in several different councils and communities, and over the past couple years I've also had the opportunity to work alongside Robert Bouchard. I had a feeling this would be less about leadership theory and more about the realities of building great teams—and it didn't disappoint. What made this conversation especially meaningful for me is that I was listening through several lenses: someone who has been managed, someone who has managed teams, and now someone who has the privilege of partnering with staffing leaders every day. Different roles, but the same question: What actually helps organizations scale? Here are the ideas that have continued to stick with me. Stop Promoting Your Best Producer One point Kevin made that really resonated with me: Stop assuming your highest performer is automatically your next great leader. It's something I've seen throughout my career. The recruiter who fills the most jobs isn't necessarily the person who enjoys coaching others. The salesperson who consistently tops the leaderboard may not be energized by developing future talent. Individual performance and leadership potential are different muscles. Too often, organizations promote someone because they're exceptional at their own role, then wonder why they struggle in leadership. The expectations have changed, but the support and development often haven't. The best leaders aren't simply great at producing results. They're great at helping other people produce results. The Scoreboard Changes Another statement that immediately made its way into my notebook was: "Your job is now to make other people good at their jobs." That single sentence captures one of the biggest mindset shifts leadership requires. As an individual contributor, success is measured by what you accomplish. As a leader, success is measured by what your team can accomplish because of your leadership. That's not always an easy transition. Many leaders were promoted because they were exceptional problem-solvers. Naturally, they continue solving every problem that comes their way. But every problem a leader solves for someone else can also become a missed opportunity for that person to grow. Leadership isn't about being the smartest person in the room. Leadership is about creating an environment where everyone else becomes smarter, more confident, and more capable. Listening Is More Powerful Than Solving Robert Bouchard shared something that I think every leader—including myself—has been guilty of at one point: Listening with the intention of responding instead of listening to understand. When someone comes to us with a challenge, our instinct is often to jump into solution mode. After all, that's what leaders do...right? But sometimes people don't need immediate answers. They need someone to ask better questions.They need space to think.They need to feel heard before they can move forward. The leaders who have had the biggest impact on my career weren't always the quickest to provide solutions. They were the ones who listened long enough to truly understand the problem. Leadership Is About Creating Opportunities, Not Just Giving Them One of my favorite moments from the conversation came from Katie Breault. She talked about the responsibility senior leaders have to create opportunities for their teams to grow. Whether that's leadership training, stretch assignments, mentorship, cross-functional projects, or simply exposing someone to a new challenge, leaders should be intentional about opening those doors. But what really stuck with me was what came next: Pay attention to what people do with the opportunity. Not everyone will walk through the door. Some people will lean in. They'll ask questions, volunteer, practice, and continue learning long after the meeting ends. Others won't. That doesn't make one person better than another, but it does reveal something important about readiness, curiosity, and ownership. As leaders, we can't force growth. We can create the environment for it. We can provide resources. We can encourage. We can coach. But at some point, each individual has to decide what they're going to do with the opportunity they've been given. I loved that perspective because leadership development isn't just about identifying potential. It's also about recognizing initiative. The people who consistently raise their hands, invest in themselves, and take action are often showing you they're ready for more responsibility before they ever ask for a promotion. That's the kind of behavior worth noticing. And rewarding. In the Age of AI, Discernment Becomes a Leadership Superpower One of the most thought-provoking moments of the conversation came when the panel discussed the leadership skills that will become increasingly important in the years ahead. Kevin's answer was discernment. That answer has stayed with me. We're entering a world where information is everywhere. AI can summarize meetings. Draft emails. Analyze data. Recommend next steps. Technology will continue getting better at producing answers. But leaders still have to decide which answers matter. Discernment is the ability to recognize nuance, evaluate competing priorities, understand people, and make thoughtful decisions when there isn't a perfect answer. In fact, I think this skill becomes more valuable as AI becomes more capable—not less. Technology can accelerate decision-making. Leadership still owns the judgment. Clarity Creates Ownership Another theme that surfaced throughout the discussion was the importance of clarity. Be incredibly clear about the outcome you're trying to achieve. Not every step. Not every task. The outcome. When people understand the destination, they can begin owning the journey. That ownership is what creates leadership depth. One thought Robert shared really reinforced this idea: Leaders don't become stronger when executives solve every problem for them. Organizations become scalable when ownership moves deeper into the business—not when every answer flows through the executive team. That requires trust. It also requires leaders who are willing to let people learn, make decisions, and occasionally make mistakes. Sometimes Leadership Is About Simplifying One of the last ideas I wrote down was simple: Simplification over complication. Leadership today can feel overwhelming. New technology. New communication channels. AI. Automation. Changing workforce expectations. It's easy to believe leadership has become more complicated than ever. In many ways, I think the opposite is true. The fundamentals of leadership haven't changed: Listen well Create clarity Develop people Exercise good judgment Recognize initiative Provide opportunities Help others become successful The tools around us will continue to evolve. Great leadership principles rarely do. My Biggest Takeaway If I had to summarize the entire discussion into one thought, it would be this: Leadership isn't about creating more leaders with impressive titles. It's about creating more people who are capable, confident, and equipped to make those around them better. This is the one theme that connected every conversation throughout the webinar. Great leaders don't build organizations by having all the answers themselves. They create clarity, develop people, provide opportunities, and then empower others to step into them. The responsibility for growth doesn't belong to leaders alone. It also belongs to the individuals willing to embrace the opportunities placed in front of them. That's how organizations scale. Not by creating dependency on a handful of exceptional people, but by intentionally building leadership at every level. One of the things I love most about my role today is having a front-row seat to so many different staffing organizations. I get to see leaders navigating growth, change, technology, and all the complexity that comes with building great teams. The firms that scale the best don't necessarily have the biggest budgets or the newest technology. They have leaders who create clarity, develop others, build trust, and intentionally grow leadership throughout the organization. Technology can enable growth. Leadership is what sustains it. Questions I'm Leaving You With As I closed my notebook, these were the questions I found myself asking: Are we promoting our best producers or our best future leaders? Am I listening to understand, or listening to respond? Am I creating meaningful opportunities for my team to grow, and are we recognizing the people who take action when those opportunities arise? Where could more clarity create more ownership? As AI becomes more capable, how am I strengthening my own discernment? A sincere thank you to TechServe Alliance for hosting such a thoughtful conversation, to Barb Bruno for moderating, and to Kevin Krumm, Katie Breault, and Robert Bouchard for sharing leadership lessons rooted in real-world experience. The best leadership conversations don't end when the webinar does. They continue in the questions we ask ourselves afterward.

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Leadership Isn’t About Having All the Answers—It’s About Building More People Who Do