Are You Working In the Business or On the Business?

In my time working in the staffing industry and leading teams, there’s a pattern I’ve seen again and again: when a team gets stuck, our instinct as leaders is often to start changing things.

Change the strategy. Change the process. Add a person. Move people around.

Sometimes that’s exactly what needs to happen.

But before you change the team, you have to understand the work. What outcome are you trying to create? What’s actually standing in the way? And is the solution really another person, or is it something else entirely?

That’s why I think one of the most important skills a leader can develop is knowing when to work ON the business and when to get IN it.

Working on the business means setting strategy, defining expectations, developing people, improving processes, and building the structure that allows a team to perform.

Working in the business means getting closer to the actual work. It means working alongside your people, asking questions, coaching in real time, and seeing firsthand what might be preventing them from getting the right outcome.

Leaders need to do both.

The real skill is knowing when to switch.

When Should Leaders Get In the Business?

Most of the time, leaders should be working on the business. If the team has what it needs and the right outcomes are happening, our job is to set the direction, uphold the standards, remove obstacles, and let great people do great work.

But when the business gets stuck, leadership from above can only tell you so much.

Maybe performance isn’t meeting expectations. New hires aren’t ramping at the pace they should. The same problem keeps resurfacing. Or you’ve tried new ideas and strategies, but the outcome isn’t changing.

That’s when I believe leaders need to get closer to the work.

When the Outcome Isn’t Changing, Stop Guessing

One of the biggest mistakes we can make as leaders is trying to solve a problem we haven’t actually diagnosed.

When performance falls short, it’s easy to immediately start looking for solutions. Maybe we need another person. Maybe we need a new process. Maybe we need to restructure the team or change the strategy.

Maybe.

But first, we need to understand what’s actually happening.

If you’re stuck, go pick one team and work alongside them for five days.

Watch how the work gets done. Look at the numbers. Review the work together. Ask questions. Coach in real time. Pay attention to where people hesitate, where things slow down, and where expectations aren’t translating into action.

You’re there to solve problems and figure out the holes.

And when you get close enough to the work, the solutions often start becoming much clearer.

What Does Working In the Business Look Like?

Getting in the business isn’t about taking over someone’s job or becoming a permanent part of their day-to-day work.

It’s about getting close enough to understand the obstacle.

I’ve always believed our job as leaders is to open doors and remove obstacles for our people. But you can’t remove an obstacle you can’t see.

Working alongside the team gives you an opportunity to understand not just what is happening, but why it’s happening.

Diagnose the Problem Before You Solve It

When you’re close enough to the work, you can start asking better questions.

Is it people in the wrong role?

Is it a poor process?

Is there a lack of standards?

Are expectations misaligned?

Does the team have the capabilities it needs?

Is there a coaching gap?

Or is the team doing exactly what we’ve asked them to do inside a system that isn’t setting them up to succeed?

In my experience, what looks like a performance problem from the outside can look very different once you’re actually in it.

There is a big difference between managing someone’s performance and understanding what’s driving it.

Leaders need to get close enough to know the difference.

When Should Leaders Get Back On the Business?

Getting in the business should have a purpose. It shouldn’t become the way you permanently manage the team.

The goal is to work alongside the team, identify the obstacle, implement the solution, and create a different outcome.

Once you understand what’s getting in the way, it’s time to step back and determine what needs to change.

Maybe you need to redesign a process. Clarify expectations. Raise a standard. Develop a capability. Redefine a role. Move people around. Change the structure.

And yes, sometimes you need to hire someone.

The important part is that the solution should address the problem you actually found, not the problem you assumed you had.

That idea extends beyond leadership and into how we build teams. 

At Mondo, it’s a philosophy we’re calling Workforce Engineering: starting with the outcome the business needs to achieve, understanding the work and capabilities required to get there, and then determining how the workforce should be built around it.

The Goal Is to Make the Team Stronger Without You

Hands-on leadership should create clarity and capability, not dependency.

If a leader has to stay embedded in the work indefinitely for the team to succeed, the underlying problem probably hasn’t been solved yet.

Get in. Work the process with the team. Coach where coaching is needed. Identify what’s standing in their way.

Then fix what needs fixing and get back out.

That’s when you move from working in the business back to working on it.

How Workforce Engineering Changes the Hiring Conversation

This same philosophy changes the way we think about hiring.

Traditional hiring conversations often begin with a role.

“We need another salesperson.”

“We need a Data Engineer.”

“We need a marketing manager.”

But I think we have to challenge ourselves to go one step further.

Do you really need that role? Or what’s the actual problem you’re trying to solve?

Start With the Outcome, Not the Job Description

Before deciding who to hire, ask:

What are we trying to accomplish?

What’s preventing us from getting there?

What work actually needs to happen?

What capabilities does that work require?

Only then can you make a better decision about how the workforce needs to be built around it.

Sometimes the answer is hiring. Sometimes it’s developing the people you already have. Sometimes it’s changing a process, redefining responsibilities, restructuring the team, or introducing a capability that didn’t exist before.

That’s what Workforce Engineering is about.

It’s not simply filling roles based on the job descriptions you’ve always had. It’s understanding the problem the business needs to solve and building the right combination of people, skills, roles, and capabilities around it.

Hiring shouldn’t be the diagnosis. It should be one of the solutions available once you understand the problem.

Great Leaders Know When to Switch

There are a million and one ways to lead. But one thing I’ve learned is that leadership requires knowing what your people need from you in that moment.

Sometimes they need you to set the direction and get out of the way.

Sometimes they need you right there with them, working through the problem until you understand what’s holding them back.

Working on the business gives you perspective.

Working in the business gives you proximity.

Stay too far above the work and you can lose sight of what’s actually happening. Stay too deep in it and your team can become dependent on you to move forward.

You need both.

When things are moving, give your people room to run.

When things are stuck, get close enough to understand why.

Find the obstacle. Fix what needs fixing. Then get back out.

The best leaders know when their business needs them ON it and when their people need them IN it.

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