August 2010

 

PART 4: Attracting and Developing Courageous Leaders

During the past few months, we have taken an in-depth look at the philosophy and practices organizations have the opportunity to embrace as they attract and develop courageous leadership. Our findings are to commit to a strategy that focuses on three distinct organizational behaviors: Alignment Markers, Internal Development Philosophy and Practices, and Leadership Selection. Today’s newsletter focuses on the topic of selection.

A typical process for choosing a leader is to design a job description, which is comprehensive and all-inclusive. A more meaningful document is one describing and prioritizing the challenges to be faced in the near future. This is a more defining guideline for discerning the candidate pool.

Once a candidate pool has been developed, whether from internal or external sources, the rigors of evaluation begin. During interviewing and checking references, there are two objectives.

Understand what a candidate has accomplished and how they have accomplished it. One must fully understand precisely how the person executes their work, what motivates them, and that he/she holds the proven skills to perform in the specified area. To accomplish the how well, a leader must have a strong and healthy self-concept; he/she has grappled with the issues of their talents and purpose in life. People follow them, and there is evidence of leadership back to early life experiences. Fundamentally understanding the past gives insight to predicting the future.

Evaluate his/her impact on their environment. How have they impacted their company or organization? How deep and broad is their contribution? What do the people they have worked with say about them? What is the untold report about them? Is this information consistent with the self-reported material?

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Leaders have a talent, but this has to be trained and polished, and it is the responsibility of both the organization and the individual. A great violinist not only has talent but also works hard at perfecting their gift. A great leader has the gift of leadership and works very hard to perfect their skills. Today’s organizations must find ways to move forward, create new pathways for
success, and discern new opportunities for growth. This takes bold and courageous leadership. Boards of Directors and executive teams that successfully wrestle with the leadership quandary find the most powerful recipe includes a balance of strategic clarity, cultural and organizational lifecycle awareness, and the willingness to make proactive talent investments.

Call us, we can help.

 

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