15 Principles for Leaders Who Want to Give More

I’m Pavel, an Engineering Manager at Wrike, and I’m responsible for people, product, and processes in a dedicated unit of three cross-functional teams focused on product growth. As a leader, I have developed certain guiding principles for myself that help me navigate in a dynamic environment alongside my teams.

I believe that it’s important for a leader to always give more than people expect. This requires a certain level of emotional intelligence, the ability to see the bigger picture from different perspectives, and some out-of-the-box thinking.

The following principles help me understand these differences and explore my role as a leader. What kind of leader am I? How well do I read people? How do I shape the environment around me? I find them inspiring, and I encourage you to give them a try, too. They can offer valuable insights and help in self-exploration.

1. Innovation in management is like art for creatives. Creative people in management are excited by innovation. Just as artists prefer to create new songs instead of solely performing the ones they already have, these managers don’t want to stick to repetitive processes; they actively embrace and drive changes, seeking to make things better and more innovative.
2. Gather feedback like a rock star: Feel the energy, not the numbers. When you play your guitar by the campfire, you don’t know if people will love your next song. You become the rock star they need, and rock stars feel the energy of a group and keep exploring different options to respond. As the leader of your team, do you tune into their energy when you perform for them?
3. If you keep paying your debt, you get more credit. This can relate to the trust others have placed in you or your processes, or it can be about tech debt in your product. Think of this debt as your bonds: You can’t simply ignore or delay them. Instead, you must find a way to incorporate them into your processes in a reliable and long-lasting manner, and then you will benefit from it.
4. Put just enough trust into others. While having a strong level of trust means you can rely on your team members and expect them to deliver, it’s also crucial to not trust them excessively. You must also challenge them mindfully and point out their mistakes. This process of constructive criticism and feedback strengthens trust even further.
5. In organizations, managers are the glue, not supervisors. We perceive it as we visualize it. Imagine a team as a circle, with the manager in the middle serving as the binding force. Similarly, higher-level managers exist between teams, effectively connecting them together. This perspective communicates a stronger and distinct message compared to the traditional hierarchical approach.
6. Approach management like a laid-back parent. When people constantly come to you for decisions, it’s up to you to decide when to put a stop to it. Just like how I know that my child can dress himself but sometimes asks for my help anyway. So I’ll explain step by step how to put on a t-shirt, and then he can do it on his own. After that, he can put on his shorts without me. Only when he really struggles with his long football socks do I step in to help him.
7. Design kindergartens for the future, not for your own childhood. When designing a kindergarten, we risk recreating the same space we had as kids years ago, which may not be suitable for kids today. Even if we enjoyed those kindergartens when we were five years old, it’s crucial to stop and think about how we can create a new environment that meets the needs of today’s children, shapes their mindset in a new way, and helps them develop even further.
8. Dinosaurs didn’t learn to fly by jumping off cliffs. They went through a process of evolution and developed wings and membranes before they could fly. Similarly, when preparing for a significant change, it’s important to focus on the necessary enablers, consider potential challenges or damage that may occur, and not expect people to adapt to and embrace the change immediately.
9. Assemblage makes champagne taste consistent. Champagne is produced from a specific blend of various grape varieties, vintages, and vineyard locations. If something goes wrong with one of them in a particular year, the others still provide the same taste when mixed together. How will you secure this blend for your team?
10. Motivate like a parent. You can’t make them do anything by force because they’ll always disagree and start a conflict. Instead, as a parent, you need to explain the reasons behind your request and ask for their opinion to make them believe it’s the right thing to do. But when a three year old disagrees, it’s evident that they’re not going to actually do it because they start a conflict. When a team disagrees with a decision, they might go along with it on the surface, but without genuine belief, nothing will really change.
11. Give everyone the benefit of the doubt — just like with your child. When a child doesn’t do their homework or take class notes, it could be because they’re behind others or feel overwhelmed and don’t believe they can catch up. They may think there’s no point in trying. In such cases, you sit down together, deal with all the problems, and start fresh the next day. The same approach applies to low performers in your team: Give them another chance, take the lead, and help them start anew.
12. Learn to embrace changes like a parent. When parents get used to their baby’s sleep patterns, they evolve from taking multiple naps to getting one longer sleep. When parents get used to feeding a newborn, the baby has grown teeth. Parents always have to be prepared for changes and learn to live with them, instead of surviving every single change and waiting for things to stabilize again.
13. Look differently when looking into the future. The Gunpowder Empires, early modern superpowers, were ultimately surpassed by Europe due to internal vulnerabilities and a lack of innovation. To thrive, they would have needed to outpace themselves. However, to foresee this need, they would have had to adopt a different viewpoint — possibly European — which proved challenging for them. Similarly, can we challenge our own perspectives to anticipate when our team or company requires significant transformative change?
14. Play with toys that don’t bring unnecessary challenges. When parents purchase numerous small puzzles, Lego bricks, or other tiny toys for their children, they not only support their early development but also find themselves crawling all over the room to gather and organize the scattered pieces. In such cases, opting for larger toys may prove more manageable. Don’t give your team complex problems if they’re not ready to own them yet. Make things easier and be there to support them in their success.
15. Evolve with fire, not just with muscles. When humanity discovered the remarkable capabilities of fire as a new source of energy, they unlocked new possibilities beyond their own physical limitations. Similarly, when a person recognizes their potential to go beyond routine tasks by establishing processes, delegating responsibilities, or scaling their impact in various ways, they undergo a profound mindset shift towards embracing a leadership role.

I’m passionate about personal and leadership transformation, and these principles have been helpful in aligning my behavior and thinking with the concept of going above and beyond as a leader.

I’d like to encourage you to reflect on them, as well, and consider how you, as a leader, can give more to the people around you by better understanding and connecting with them and by creating a next-level environment for all of you to work in.