Why do technically brilliant leaders avoid difficult performance conversations?

A technician - and I don't mean only engineers, I mean anyone who has built their identity around mastering a craft - tends to be an idealist about that craft. They have a clear and deeply held sense of how things "should be done. That word - “should” is one of the most revealing words in the English language. It means: “How I expect things to be”. Any time we use should, we are subtly disengaging with how things are, and comparing them with how we want things to be (and usually getting annoyed).

Because reality, particularly in the form of other people, rarely cooperates.

What technically brilliant leaders tend to do when reality doesn't match the ideal is get frustrated rather than curious. The performance conversation that needs to happen gets replaced by an internal monologue about standards. And then it doesn't happen at all.

Why avoidance makes complete sense

If you're an L&D professional reading this and finding it frustrating that leaders avoid the harder performance conversations, it's worth remembering something. Your background and theirs are kind of opposite.

You came up working with the people who do the work. Your performance was measured on how well you related to others, how well you navigated the uncomfortable conversation. That's your craft.

They came up doing the work itself. Their performance was measured on the quality of the output. Other people were largely beside the point (and sometimes in the way).

Nobody is naturally comfortable with things they've had the least practice at. For a technically brilliant leader, the performance conversation is unfamiliar territory. And unfamiliar territory, particularly when the stakes feel high, tends to get avoided.

This isn't weakness. It's entirely predictable.

What actually helps

The starting point is helping the leader to see these conversations non-negotiable. Not by forcing (necessarily), but by discussion and reframe. Real confidence is only built by doing the difficult thing, and built over time. A coach (or coaching approach) can help a leader get enough initial ground under their feet to begin. Frameworks and methodologies have their place here too, at least early on. Lack of clarity on how to do something only lessens the chances of whether or not we actually attempt it.

But at a certain point, there is no workaround. Performance conversations are part of the job. A leader who continues to avoid them should expect, at some point, to find themselves on the receiving end of one. Perhaps held by someone equally uncomfortable with performance conversations. The irony.

If you're working with a technically brilliant leader who has recently stepped into a broader role, this article covers the wider transition in more detail.