I would just tell you about the first time I realised that being good at your job is not the same as being seen. I was in my twenties, I used to work in a hotel in Berkshire, and I was doing my own job and I was doing it well. And then my boss left, so I did his job too. And then someone else left and I ended up doing their job. So you'd have thought on paper I was the ideal person to get the next promotion. But I didn't. You see, for many years I thought I didn't get that promotion because of him, that new boss. But it wasn't. You see, I really wanted to work in a hotel. I wrote 80 letters to 80 different hotels. I got very used to getting rejection letters straight back. I didn't have a vast amount of experience, but I'd done catering at college and I just knew I could do it, and I just enjoyed helping serving and making a difference. I remember getting the call one day from a lady who was the general manager of a hotel in Berkshire, and she said to me that she had a beverage manager job vacant. Long story short, I started there. I moved in, I lived in the staff accommodation, used to be a house separate across the car park. You bond when you sort of live and work together, and you really want to support each other and make sure that you help out as much as you can and you support them and you just work as a team, and even socially, you tend to go out and be together. And then the food and beverage manager left, and so I started covering for him. Because really, when you've got the bars, and then obviously the restaurants just sort of merge into together so you can sort of cover it, and I covered his days off anyway, so you just end up covering seven days rather than two days. And so we went along and and that was good. I was enjoying it, and I was thinking I'm doing a good job, and I'm demonstrating the great job that I'm doing, and then the reception manager went, so I was looking after the reception as well. And we only had one receptionist because we had vacancies, and so therefore, the two of us would work six-day weeks, and on one of those days we'd do a double to cover the other one so they could have a day off. And we I just plowed everything into it, and I just knew that with all this hard work I would see the rewards and reap them through being promoted. It was also that type of hotel where you had a lot of regulars, particularly in the bar, so you knew lots of people that lived nearby. So it was a friendly place, and that went a long way to being happy and prepared to put the hours in. I can remember one day for me at the time, quite devastating news that the general manager was leaving. I liked her, she'd always supported me, always gave me guidance and helped me along the way. And a new general manager was coming. Like everything, there was rumours about how he was and who he was and what he did and where he'd been and which hotels he'd run. But he arrived and well pretty soon I felt it quite hard to communicate with him. I got to a stage where I just didn't know the right words to say, the right way to explain stuff. On top of that, he often would ask why this hadn't been done and that hadn't been done, and all I was thinking was, I'm doing three people's jobs here, and all you want is more and more out of me. And it felt unfair, it felt that he didn't recognize me, he didn't understand what I wanted, where I was coming from. You see, at that time, that 23-year-old, I didn't have the tools, I didn't know how to communicate well. I thought communicating was just saying words out loud, and even though I knew I didn't sound confident in what I was saying, I thought words were the thing, and a lot of the time he would say stuff and I didn't even say words back, I guess. I just sort of took it and carried on and gradually found it harder and harder, even though I was doing the job. See being the one that picks everything up and make it work doesn't actually get you promoted, it just gets you more to pick up. Competence buys work, not progression. I call this the smooth trap. You see, the smooth trap is when managers like you prioritize stability and reliability for their teams, problems are solved quickly, pressure's absorbed, and disruption is kept to a minimum and dealt with. In the short term, this all works, the environment stays calm and well managed, but over time it creates a hidden pattern. You see, when you solve every problem yourself, the system slowly adapts around your behavior. What begins as a helpful leadership becomes a silent expectation. Your team becomes used to you to things just working and you just solving them. You become the safety net and the pressure becomes invisible. You can see it like a loop. The problem appears, but you the manager absorbs that pressure, you build disability and you make it return. Expectation increases from above and below, and for you the pressure just grows. Each cycle of this pattern, that pressure grows. The more capable you are, the more likely the loop will just continue. You see, I thought communication was just saying words out loud. I didn't understand there was more to it than just that. See, they'd ask me questions and I thought they were unfair. Why should I be able to answer some of those questions? And he'd say that that this was wrong and that was wrong and stuff. And I used to go away and I'd just think, oh, you're just picking on me, you're just mean to me, you're just horrible to me. But I wouldn't say anything back rarely because I couldn't get the words out, I couldn't construct a cohesent reply that made any sense. So I guess why didn't I get the job? Why didn't he see what was so obvious to me that I should get the job, I should get the next level up. I was doing the jobs. I was doing three different jobs. But why? Well, I guess if I'm honest, he didn't really rate me. And that was the answer for years I gave myself. I didn't progress there, and that's why I left because he didn't rate me. And it was entirely his fault. But I guess if I was being a bit more honest with myself, I thought it was unfair. I was doing three jobs. I was covering I was working six days a week. I was doing a role the reception role that wasn't even my role. I was never employed to do that. So surely he should be seeing this. You see I'd lost my old hotel manager and I knew she knew that. She knew how much I'd put in, how much extra and above the line. But I guess he'd come in and it just inherited a rotor. And the rotor said that's all I did. And I expected him to know. I just expected him to know. And if I'm brutally honest with myself, I guess there was a fix. But I didn't take it. I didn't do it. You know, I never told him. I never explained what I was doing, the extra I was doing, how I was handling it. The six days I was doing, the hard work I was putting in. I thought it all spoke for itself. You see, I knew I was good at what I did. But why would he? He then just got there. I guess I was waiting to be chosen because I didn't want to say out loud that I wanted the job. And the reason I didn't want to say that out loud was in case I didn't get the job. That fear of failure. That fear of not meeting your own expectations. But you keep your own expectations locked in your head, and you don't tell anyone them, and you don't even really tell yourself honestly what they are, but then you blame your boss for not knowing, and you can convince yourself of all those reasons why they should know. Because you work long hours, because you put the graft in, because you cover. Why haven't they seen that? Well, because they're not next to you 24 hours a day, they're not your shadow, and they may not know. So I guess now being honest with myself, you see, competence boys you work, not progression. You see, over time, I guess I became resentful. And the issue with resentment is when you are looking in, you're looking at that person that's starting to feel resentful, who believes that they're being treated unfairly. That resentment doesn't look like unfairness, it looks like attitude. And if I'm truly honest with myself, probably at that twenty-something year old lad, I did have a chip on my shoulder and that's what it looked like. So you probably wasn't entirely wrong. When your boss changes, just make an assumption that the your new boss doesn't know. Doesn't know about all the things you've been doing, all the extra you do, what you cover for, on top of your job description on your normal day. Have those conversations, just ask, ask for some time, sit down and have that conversation. You're not trying to complain, you're not trying to pitch, you're just trying to inform so they've got a clear picture so they know where you're coming from. In the show notes below, you can get hold of my free guide called Why Conversations Keep Going Sideways if you find these conversations difficult. It just gives you sensible, easy tips on how to structure and the reasons why conversations might go sideways. But go and have those conversations, ask for the time and go and share how you're feeling. It's important that your online manager knows. Just as important as you make the time for your people and make sure that they're having the conversations with you. And if they're not brave enough, if they haven't had those conversations yet, ask them. Go and sit down, have a cup of tea, coffee with them, and just see what they've got to share with you. You see, in that hotel, the person that really knew me, the person that knew what I was putting into that role and why I was and how I loved it and wanted to support the people I was with, that person left. And a new person came along that didn't understand. But more importantly, as a 23-year-old, I didn't understand that he wouldn't know. So think about yourself, your own workplace. Who is the person there that knows what you're carrying? It's not about the job role, it's about what you actually do, what you actually carry. So ask yourself whether they're still in the building. And if the answer's not that might mean nobody really knows. So go and have those conversations. Thank you for listening to Breaking the Circle for Leaders. I hope you've enjoyed this week's episode, and subscribe to make sure you get next week's two. And as always, I'm rooting for you.