Eight steps to building strong management
This new year, managers and executives who have vowed to get into shape can also make their companies stronger – by beefing up company leadership with eight resolutions offered by Development Dimensions International (DDI).
"All of us have made new year’s resolutions that we didn’t keep, but when executives fail to follow through on leadership and individual development plans, their companies suffer," said Matthew Paese, practice leader of DDI’s Executive Succession Management Group. "Effective development of managers and executives is one of the key differences between companies that are positioned for growth and those that are setting themselves up for failure."
More than 470 CEOs of major companies departed their jobs in the first half of 2001, and the exodus from the executive suite continued in the second half. Recent studies by DDI, a global human resource consulting firm specializing in leadership development and selection systems design, show that both employees and executives lack confidence in their companies’ leadership. The root of the problem is that too many companies have built succession management systems but don’t truly support them, just as many people buy treadmills or exercise bikes then fail to use them.
8 steps to build strong leadership
1. Make a leadership game plan. Determine what type of leadership your company will need in the future. Create a plan that identifies potential leaders, diagnoses their developmental needs, lists actions for development and measures progress. Linking it back to your business strategy is key.
2. Hire all-around athletes. Understand what skills, knowledge and competencies your team needs today and in the future. Hire those individuals who can play a variety of positions as your company grows and changes.
3. Test for success. To clearly identify potential and prescribe development, use appropriate tools such as assessment centers, simulations and paper and pencil tests.
4. Don’t get caught in a leadership "half nelson." You or the leaders who work for you can be sabotaged by ignoring 11 "derailers." Pay attention to potential leaders who might have these qualities-they could derail you and themselves. Derailers include: impulsiveness, low tolerance for ambiguity, arrogance, micromanagement, self-promotion, volatility, risk aversion, defensiveness, imperceptivity, approval dependence and
eccentricity.
5. Make stretch assignments. Challenging job assignments or new projects will help new leaders develop more quickly. Give team members the opportunity to try out new positions.
6. Know the ropes of development. There are many ways to develop new skills – online learning, in the classroom, new job assignments, shadowing others, etc. The key is to understand which approaches work for the individual and the skills, knowledge or competencies that need to be developed.
7. Bring in the coach. The manager of a high-potential employee is not always the best coach. Seek out people who may have coaching skills and the competencies your high-potential team member needs.
8. Keep score. Most people can create a development plan, but of those that do, 70% do not review and measure progress of development. If development isn’t happening or you don’t know if what is happening is effective, then new leaders cannot emerge.
"As in anything else, the way to improve leadership development is to push yourself and others to grow," Paese said. "Executives must make an intense, personal commitment to make building leadership throughout their organizations as urgent a goal as meeting customer deadlines, developing new products or cutting costs.
