Apr 15 / Shelley Walters

Choose the Leader, Not Just the Job

In 1999, I started in sales selling fax machines, photocopiers, and printers.

There are people who will read this who have never had the misfortune of dealing with thermal fax rolls. They have missed absolutely nothing.

It was a different world. I was told, more than once, that the entry requirement for sales was the ability to walk and chew at the same time. Political correctness had not really arrived. Sexism was normalised. If a customer arrived, the nearest woman was often expected to make tea or coffee, whether that was her job or not.

That was the environment I came into.

My first manager was a man called Gordon. He was rough, gruff, direct, highly intelligent, commercially sharp, and extremely exacting. We did not get on especially well. There were arguments. There were tears. There was feedback that, at the time, felt like a personal insult rather than professional guidance.

He was not somebody I would have gone to with my personal issues. He was not soft. He was not warm. He was not trying to be my friend.

But if I wanted to improve my sales performance, he was absolutely a safe place.

He taught me how to think about conversion rates properly, lead to discovery, discovery to proposal, proposal to close, back then with pen and paper. This was before dashboards, before CRM obsession, before every metric had a fancy label attached to it. He taught me how to think commercially. He taught me how to pay attention. He taught me that standards mattered.

I began in direct sales, literally knocking on doors carrying what we used to call a site sell, essentially a heavy corporate case packed with brochures printed on thick stock, contracts, black pens, and whatever else you needed to try and win business face to face. We were dressed to the nines. It was hard graft.

From there, I moved into fast response and eventually into account management in record time. Six months. I stayed in that environment for around five years before moving into asset finance, and then into a season in my late twenties where I was still trying to find my fit. At one point I even sold power tools. I realised fairly quickly that simple order-taking sales was not for me. I was under-stimulated and frustrated.

Later, I worked at a radio station and once again found myself working for a manager who made me angry, challenged me, and pushed me hard. One day I got so frustrated that I called him an asshole. I will never forget his response. He simply said, that’s okay, you’ll get over it.

At the time, that kind of leadership could feel infuriating.

Now I’m 46, and I see it differently.

When people ask me for career advice, especially when they are choosing between roles, I tell them this: choose the leader you work for as carefully as you choose the company you work for. In fact, in many cases, choose the leader even more carefully.

Because the right leader will shape you.

Not every demanding leader is a good leader. Let me be clear about that. Some people are simply erratic, ego-driven, demeaning, or unsafe. Difficulty on its own is not developmental. A hard environment is not automatically a healthy one.

But I think we make a mistake when we judge leadership quality mainly by likability.

Some of the leaders who did the most for my growth were not easy to work for. They were demanding. They were disagreeable. They were exacting. They expected a lot. They did not spend a great deal of time making me feel comfortable.

But they were also structured. Fair. Competent. Clear. They knew what good looked like. They could see more in me than I could see in myself, and they were willing to insist that I rise to meet it.

That is leadership quality.

True leaders make you better, not just more comfortable.
That does not mean they are always gentle. It does not mean they always package feedback beautifully. It does not mean they never trigger your ego, expose your immaturity, or leave you feeling bruised at the end of a hard day.

It means their leadership has intent.

They are not applying pressure for sport. They are not criticising to diminish you. They are not withholding clarity while expecting excellence. They are trying to build capability. They are trying to raise your standard. They are trying to prepare you for more than the job you are currently in.

And that matters.

Particularly early in your career, it is very easy to confuse emotional comfort with professional progress. It is very easy to think, I like this person, therefore they must be a good leader. Or, this person makes me feel bad, therefore they must be a bad one.

Life is not that neat.

Sometimes the boss who bruises your ego is the one building your future.

Sometimes the boss who protects your feelings is the one slowing your growth.

The question is not simply, do I enjoy working for this person?

The question is, what is happening to me under their leadership?

Am I becoming sharper? Am I becoming more commercially astute? Am I learning discipline? Am I being held to a real standard? Has this leader raised my self-expectation? Do I believe in myself more now than I did before working for them? Am I growing in judgment, resilience, and maturity? Am I being developed for the next level, or merely soothed in the current one?

That, to me, is the test.

While you are moving up, be careful who shapes you.

Because over time, leaders do not only influence your performance. They influence your self-concept, your standards, your tolerance for ambiguity, your emotional regulation, your appetite for excellence, and your sense of what is possible for you.

A strong leader does not just get more work out of you. They raise your self-expectation. They leave you expecting more from yourself than you did before. They expand your belief in your own capability.

A good leader does not only get work out of you. A good leader leaves you more capable than they found you.

Looking back, I can see that some of the managers I resisted most were also the ones who accelerated my growth most. Not because they were nice. Not because they were easy. But because they were serious. They had standards. They cared about performance. They were willing to have the hard conversations. And they were competent enough to teach me something worth learning.

So if you are early in your career, or even mid-career and considering your next move, do not choose based only on title, salary, flexibility, brand, or whether the hiring manager seems pleasant in an interview.

Ask yourself who this leader is.

Ask whether they are credible. Ask whether they are fair. Ask whether they are consistent. Ask whether they can teach you something. Ask whether their standards will stretch you in the right way. Ask whether they are the sort of person under whom you are likely to become better, stronger, wiser, and more capable.

Because the truth is this.

Not everyone who makes you uncomfortable is against you. Not everyone who relieves your discomfort is helping you grow.
Choose the leader, not just the job.

And if you find a leader who is demanding, fair, competent, and invested in your growth, do not walk away too quickly just because they make you uncomfortable.

That discomfort may be the very thing that is growing you up.