Carlos was the best engineer on his team at a manufacturing company. He could spot problems others missed and was known for getting difficult projects back on track. His promotion to Engineering Director seemed obvious. Six months later, Carlos is still reviewing designs, correcting technical decisions, and jumping into meetings when his managers struggle. He is working harder than before, and his managers are beginning to wait for him. Carlos was promoted because of what he could do. No one taught him how his value needed to change when his job became developing people who could do it without him.
- Value Misalignment: He still sources his value from personal execution (reviewing, rescuing) rather than transferring the work.
- Skill Mismatch: The skills that earned his promotion (technical speed, output) are not the skills his new role requires (delegating outcomes).
- The Ceiling Effect: Without a deliberate shift, he defaults to doing the work himself, becoming the team's bottleneck instead of its multiplier.
What does the shift from expert to advisor actually look like?
An expert, sometimes also an individual contributor (IC), is someone with deep, specialized knowledge or skill in a particular domain. An expert has experience and can easily problem solve in their niche area of excellence. They are often consulted for answers.
An advisor is someone who uses knowledge to guide another person's or organization's decisions over time.
An advisor often works with you over time and can understand your situation and context, constraints, values, and history. They look at the bigger picture rather than just one small frame.
In practice, an expert knows a lot about one thing and advisor helps you to apply expert insights to decide and act.
Stop Being the Bottleneck
Watch this to learn how leaders can stop being the bottleneck and start building a team that thinks, decides and owns the outcome.
Learn more about the expert-to-leader transition
Managing to Fail? Why New Leaders Need Training
Why first-time leaders are often set up to fail and what organizations can do differently.
SHRMFirst-Time Managers Are Often Ill-Prepared
Research on why the transition from individual contributor to manager is so consistently difficult.
DDIGlobal Leadership Forecast 2025
The latest data on leadership readiness, development gaps, and what organizations are getting wrong.
Where do you see yourself or your team in these scenarios?
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