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Rising To Your Title

For those of you who don’t watch Bravo, Top Chef: Just Desserts is a pastry-only spinoff of their emmy-winning Top Chef series. One of the most beloved contestants of this season has been 38-year old Eric Wolitzky of Baked bakery in Brooklyn, NY. He has been known for two things: being pretty much the only sane person in a house full of divas and borderline personalities, and being a “baker” among fancy pastry chefs.  Throughout the season he has shown that although he’s not the best at refined presentation, his flavors are spot-on. From the very beginning he operated under a blanket of insecurity about his lack of specialized skills.  However, he made it from a group of 12 accomplished chefs into the top 5, even winning a couple of challenges along the way. This week he finally lost out when a twist in the challenge threw him off his game.

What really struck me was what happened after Eric got eliminated. Renowned pastry chef and head judge Johnny Iuzzini told Eric he was an amazing chef, and his fellow contestants echoed the sentiment. Eric was moved to tears, exclaiming repeatedly on his way out, “I’m a pastry chef!  I’m not just a baker; I’m a pastry chef!” In his closing interview he talked about how he had gained confidence from his time on the show, and how the validation from those he respected made him look at himself differently.

As most good managers know, showing confidence in someone’s abilities and recognizing them for their accomplishments can lead them to view themselves in a whole new light. If you see potential in one of your employees, why not give them additional responsibility that might be a bit out of their comfort zone and let them run with it? If they do well, and get recognition for doing well, they will continue to build both the confidence and skill needed to rise to the occasion, and even take on additional tasks in the future. 

Of course you can’t just go around promoting people and hoping for the best, or increasing workloads to the breaking point. This is about employee enrichment—ensuring that your organization is putting its people and their development first.  In their recent white paper, Leading in the New Age of Putting People First, The Forum for People Performance Management puts forth:

“A people-first approach to leadership prioritizes such things as the meaning of work and expands the concept of growth to include not just an employee’s professional growth, but also his/her personal growth. In a culture of employee enrichment, leaders encourage individual employee growth not only in ways that are consistent with organizational performance but, more importantly, they support those things that genuinely enhance the quality of employees’ lives. Enrichment leadership helps employees move from the mindset of ‘having a job,’ to the broader attitude of ‘having a career,’ and, ultimately, to the self-satisfying perspective of ‘having a calling.’”

This is an important point—if an employee considers his or her job a career or a calling, that employee is much more likely to be engaged, to be proactive about his development, and to stay at the organization to further that development.  Just because someone is really great at packing boxes (or baking) doesn’t meant that person might not be thrilled and energized to be trained in inventory management (or making exquisite sugar flowers).