The best leaders are willing to join their team in the trenches

Leaders, the easiest way to get your team motivated is to roll your sleeves up and get hands-on

I’m increasingly convinced of the death of the “people manager” as a complete job. Future leaders and bosses will be hands-on generalists who can jump in the trenches with their team when required.

Nowhere is this more evident than when you need to motivate your team to do something. As a founder or leader, no job should be beneath you in pursuit of galvanising your troops to do great work.

At Even, we found ourselves in a great position of product-market fit. Leads were flying in, including one million-view TikTok post that delivered us 500 leads in a weekend.

The next job was to turn these leads into qualified leads who were almost ready to buy their home with Even’s help.

The amount of people who I’ve witnessed turn to email at this pivotal moment is frankly embarrassing. Yes, getting on the phone is awkward. Yes, it’s even more awkward in front of your colleagues.

So what did we do? We sliced up the call list and EVERYONE got on the phone. Me, the CMO, James, the COO, and Matt, the CEO included.

I’ve seen leaders angrily decrying the lack of phone bashing by their team, while simultaneously considering themselves “too senior” or whatever to jump on the phone themselves.

So here’s the question: if the founder of a billion dollar company can jump on the phones to motivate their team, why are you above it?

This rule applies to any role or team in a growing business. If there is any mundane or anxiety-inducing task to be done, you should be prepared to do it as a leader.

This isn’t an isolated incident. In fact, pretty much every great founder I’ve met is ready to dive in when duty calls - whether it’s committing code or starring in TikTok videos.

When Brett sold Streetcar to Zipcar I can only presume he did well out of it - well he looked quite happy at the time!

Then he started his next business, Lovespace.

And how did he get his first customers? Flyering outside Clapham Common tube station. I know this ‘cos I was there helping him out!

The reality is that he can’t have expected his team to muck in if he wasn’t prepared to do it himself.

“No job too small“

If you’re still not convinced - here’s another: Ryan was running a profitable and growing business at MyBuilder.

After a string of unsuccessful office cleaners (we were bloody messy to be fair) he took the executive decision that we would do the cleaning ourselves - with each task on rotation.

And to save squabbles, he put himself on permanent toilet duties.

I’ll be honest - Would I do that with my team? No. But do I respect the attitude. And in a strange way, those Friday afternoon cleaning sessions were great for team cohesion.

So, if you are a leader that expects your team to do something menial, challenging or unrewarding - there is no other way that rolling your sleeves up, leading from the front, and doing it yourself.