The Working Genius in MSPs with Patrick Lencioni

Even hardworking teams sometimes struggle. It doesn’t mean you’ve made a bad hire or they aren’t understanding the job. Often, it means you aren’t making the most your team.

Patrick Lencioni, a bestselling author and business management expert, spoke at the Q3 MSP Success Producers Club meeting in Franklin, Tenn. about how to get more from your team. Discussing his latest book, The 6 Types of Working Genius, he explained how an MSP can increase productivity, lower stress and improve performance without adding headcount.

The 6 types of working genius

Consider your team. A technician who is technically sharp but miserable on client calls isn’t the wrong hire. A salesperson who is great with customers but struggles with closing sales isn’t someone who should be let go. Both bring value to the team and contribute to the business. They may, however, be better suited for different roles.

The idea behind Lencioni’s six types of genius is that every job draws on a mix of the same six skill types:

• Wonder: Asking big questions and sitting with curiosity
• Invention: Generating new ideas from scratch
• Discernment: Evaluating ideas and sensing whether something will work
• Galvanizing: Rallying people around a vision and moving a group forward
• Enablement: Helping others accomplish their goals
• Tenacity: Finishing tasks and having a sense of completion

Each person has two skills that energize them, two neutral competencies and two working frustrations that deplete them. Most people spend years in their frustration zones, which leads to dissatisfaction and friction that may come across as incompetence.

Misaligned roles lead to underperformance, burnout and turnover. In an industry where finding and keeping good IT talent is one of the hardest parts of running the business, it’s a problem you can’t afford to ignore.

4 ways MSP owners can improve their team

Lencioni walked through four specific steps MSPs can take to improve their teams.

1. Hire for the work, not the title

Instead of posting a job description based on generalized tasks that role can do, be specific. What is expected of that employee on a typical Tuesday? Then, hire someone who finds that work energizing.

For example, consider a marketing role. Do you need someone to come up with bold new campaign ideas or someone who is great at generating sales leads?

Lencioni explains that those tasks require two very different skills. One is for someone who is energized by Wonder or Invention. The other is best for Tenacity. While most candidates will say they can do both and may even have experience with both, the real question is whether the day-to-day job pulls from a strength or a weakness.

To make the most of your team, hire the person who finds that work energizing, not the person who just says they can handle it.

2. Don’t hire to fill a gap that isn’t there

When something isn’t working, an MSP owner’s first instinct is often to hire. For example, the team is struggling with proactive client communication? You might consider hiring a new account manager. But that instinct often reflects a gap in team awareness more than a gap in headcount.

Before adding a new role, take stock of the skills your team already has. Ask them what work they genuinely look forward to vs. what work consistently drains them. A technician who hates documentation might love talking to customers. A sales rep who is great at closing sales could also love helping his teammates learn new things. Filling a gap might be as easy as rearranging job duties.

“Because you know how one man or woman’s trash is another man or woman’s treasure?” Lencioni said. “When a whole organization knows what everybody’s trash and treasure are, productivity and morale, effectiveness, customer satisfaction can go through the roof instead of having to hire another person.”

3. Underperformers may need a change, not an exit

Not every underperformer is the wrong person for your business. If someone fits the culture, cares about the work and shares your values, writing them off before asking why they’re struggling is a missed opportunity.

Lencioni shared a story: An employee headed into a performance review bracing for the worst after having a genuinely difficult year. He found Working Genius and shared his results with his manager, who gave him a promotion to a different job. The role was the problem, not the person.

“When you’re working in your two lowest areas — your working frustrations — that’s where you lose your energy,” Lencioni explained. “And that leads to really bad things with an organization.”

Even at MSPs, potentially good performers get written off every day because no one stops to ask whether the role itself is the issue. Asking that question and being willing to act costs less than replacing someone, and it builds the kind of loyalty that makes a team want to stay.

4. Know your own genius

What are your Working Genius skills? How do they best fit into your team? Oftentimes people tend to hire people who think the way they think, work the way they work and get energized by the same things they do. That feels comfortable, but it creates gaps that quietly compound over time.

“Let’s say you’re a CEO and your genius is Wonder and Invention. You’re hiring a head of marketing,” Lencioni said, giving an example. “You’re not going to hire someone to do what you already do naturally. You need somebody to take your idea and implement it.”

If you’re the one generating ideas and casting vision, you don’t need another visionary. You need a Tenacity. If you’re the one who can close any room but struggles to sit still long enough to evaluate, you need a Discernment.

Don’t let blind spots shape every hire you make. Understanding your own genius isn’t just self-awareness, it’s also the starting point for building a team.

“You’re an MSP. You have people with clients and doing all this stuff,” Lencioni said. “Look at the other people on your team and figure out where your gaps are.”

Most MSPs look outward when growth stalls, a new tool, a new hire, a new strategy. Lencioni says to look inward first.

Read more about the events of Q3 MSP Success Producers Club. Read Q3 Producers Club: culture and growth.