Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on December 3, 2021, 12:58 pm

That could have certainly been handled better.

And yes, you lost power there.

At that point, it would have been better to address Carol very directly, calling her out on her "uncool behavior".
It would have been better to make bad blood with Carol than to let her get away with it.

But the main mistake was BEFORE that.

And in the mindset as well.

Tough love here:

Had you escalated with your current mindset and skills, IF you had won the "power VS power" frame, you'd come out of it higher power, but that would have been "dickhead" power mode and the team would have lost.
And, ultimately, that too would have been poor leadership.

Assigning Tasks: The Power Protecting Moode

Have you encountered in PU the "power protecting" concept?

It's especially useful when:

1. You don't have direct authority
2. The group doesn't recognize you as an undisputed unofficial authority
3. What you're asking might be unfair / power taking / value taking / high effort

And assigning a task that is "grey area" is often value-taking, because Carol righteously thinks "why me?".

When you assign top-down, the way you did, she has to give value, expand effort... While getting no credits.

Now:

a more submissive woman would have said "ok", but it was still the wrong move because you disempower someone in your team. You don't look very value-giving as a leader, and you're taking advantage of the submissive members of your team to push work on them.

Not very eagle-like, and certainly doesn't develop team spirit because the higher power guys will think "I must maintain power so this guy doesn't push shit on me" and the submissive ones will feel unjustly overburdened.

So the better power protecting alternative, which in this case happens to be a more "democratic" form of leadership:

guys, there is this task still left hanging. Any volunteers?

NOW that's a hell of a power move.

Because when you put it up for "volunteers", it's not shoved down their throat and they get social credit for their volunteering.

And you, as a budding great leader, will make that credit even bigger:

You: guys, there is this task pending, any volunteers? (look around)
Carol: hmmm... OK, I can take it
You: Thank you, you're awesome Carol, thank you from me and for the whole team, if you need any help with that, we're here -or at least I'm here (smile as you say that)-. And next time someone else or myself will take the extra task

Does it make sense?

Edit:
Typos, improvements

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on December 3, 2021, 2:01 pm

P.S.:

And my bad for not finding the positives here:

Well done on getting that group lead, and well done on your honest self-analysis and admitting your anger and possible mistake. No self-development can even start without those two foundational pieces.

Quote from Mathieu on December 3, 2021, 2:08 pm

Lucio,

That makes perfect sense to me, thanks a lot for the feedback.
I just want to extend the thread one more bit and cover all possibilities:

What if nobody volunteers?...

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on December 3, 2021, 2:20 pm

Quote from Mathieu on December 3, 2021, 2:08 pm

Lucio,

That makes perfect sense to me, thanks a lot for the feedback.
I just want to extend the thread one more bit and cover all possibilities:

What if nobody volunteers?...

Let's start by restating the most likely scenario:

In any good team, even "good enough teams", most of the times someone will volunteer as long as there is a minimum team spirit -which in very large part is up to the leader-.

But let's take the worst-case scenario.

That's where some persuasion ju-jitsu kicks in:

You: guys, there is this task pending, any volunteers? (look around)
(crickets)
You: anyone, anyone... ?
(crickets)
You: anyone with just 10 minutes to spare?
(crickets)
You: easy guys, all this commitment to the goal and we might do too dangerously well as a team (smiles, you want to make light of it. Make it too grave and you thread expand on the negative and it turns into a "who's the loser who will relent")
(laughter but not volunteers)
You: OK guys, you really want to turn me salesman here. What if the person who takes it gets (see if you can give something, like not doing it next time) plus my eternal gratitude (laugh as you say it, it's important to keep an upbeat mood so you don't thread expand on the negative that the team isn't very forthcoming)
(crickets)
You: I get it. I think that we don't wanna stay here for one more hour discussing this and the task needs to be done (this is important to self-frame as a "get it done leader"). So I propose this: we take turns for these leftovers tasks and every one of us will eventually do it. I propose we decide it now by counting. Everyone throws a number, and we start counting from me. Are you guys cool with that?

Alternatively, if you have a smaller workload or if you wanna give the example, you can also say:

You: Alright, let's do this then, we'll take turns with the leftover tasks, and this first one, I'll take it.
Sounds good with you guys?

Quote from Matthew Whitewood on December 3, 2021, 2:39 pm

Maybe you're already doing this, but I'll write this out in case it's relevant and useful.

Meeting dynamics can be challenging.
I think if you're not so confident in handling meeting dynamics, you can have more 1-to-1 interactions to get buy-in separately.

You also get to know each person better.
Then, maybe you find out

• Carol likes marketing and singing
• Samuel likes software development
• Michael likes graphics design and copywriting

I'm adding random stuff like singing because you may find out about people's unexpected interests which may be useful in the project.

Then, it's also easier to ask their interests in grey area matters too.

For example,

You: Hey Carol, this project has several components.
Marketing, software development, graphics design, etc.
Which interests you the most?

Carol: I enjoy marketing.
I like singing as well by the way.

You: Awesome, what do you think of taking charge of our social media marketing?

Everyone has sort of been "tasked" on the 1-to-1.
Then, the project meeting update becomes like a summary.
You also look powerful because more people agree with you without much discussion.

During the project meeting

You: Carol, so you enjoy social media marketing.
What do you think of (add here)?

Carol: Sounds good

You: Thanks, your skills in that area really showcase our event/product very well on behalf of the team.

You: Michael, you are awesome with graphics design.
It adds another dimension to how we package things.
What do you think of (add here)?

...

You: By the way, Carol has kindly volunteered to help the team with (grey area stuff).
Big thanks from me and the team.

...

I've just started reading the book:
Project Leadership: From Theory to Practice

Useful in my opinion and would recommend for project team dynamics.