By examining organisations that both succeed and fail, so much of this success or failure comes down to its leadership. A sweeping statement maybe, but if you drill down a causal fact is the companyâs leaders. Direction, strategy, decision making, behaviours, development, coaching, talent management, performance management, effectiveness, efficiency, role modelling, budgets, culture. All the hinge on the quality of the organisationâs leaders and their leadership.
Speaking to programme delegates and friends about their organisations, the common theme that comes out is around their organisationâs leaders. Their behaviours, mindset, lack of awareness, lack of engagement, poor 121s, communication, poor people skills, say one thing do another. I am sure you will also have your own themes from your organisations. âGoodâ leadership is overlooked by organisations. Or, leadership is expected as a default, but investment, role modelling, expectations, accountability isnât present for âgood leadershipâ to be enacted.
It starts at the top
Hey senior leaders! Yes you guys! Please donât look away. Itâs about you. If you want quality leaders in your team and organisations, then look at yourselves firstâŠ
Strong, quality senior leadership is essential in ensuring that the standard, behaviours, accountability and responsibilities around its organisational leaders are known, understood, adhered to and delivered. This is the only way the quality, consistency, reputation and belief around your leadership be established. Sadly, quality senior leadership is too often missing. Without it there is little hope of achieving good leadership consistently in the rest of your business.
Senior leaders often are quick to blame lower leaders and managers, when in fact the phrase âchange starts with meâ is very apt here. Donât expect your leaders to change if they donât see it in you first⊠Whilst running a leadership programme with an IT company in London recently, the SLT were very aware of and open to the need to be different in their leadership for the sake of their people. If they wanted different outcomes, they themselves had to be different.
Causes of these leadership failures
A key challenge around senior leadership across the organisation is the failure to set standards and expectations for leaders and leadership. AND, holding people accountable to these standards. Leadership for the organisation should be defined and shaped. If leaders donât know what is expected of them â skills, behaviours, values, attributes et al, then they won’t exhibit and become them.
So often when leader development is brought into organisations, senior leaders are not involved. Itâs the âotherâ leaders that are put on this development. So, from the outset, difference is introduced. Many senior leaders to not have a clear understanding around leadership, knowledge, skills and behaviours. All the good ideas, models, theories discussed on these programmes are not understood or used by senior leaders. Time and time again when running these programmes I will hear the pines of â âI wish my leader did this for usâŠâ Guaranteed.
Across organisations my experiences tell me that accountability for all employees is often quite poor. This applies to leaders as well. Where values or competencies are in place, rarely are leaders held accountable to them? Additionally, leaders can be fearful in holding people to account, but if the expectations are discussed and evidence is collated, holding to account shouldn’t be an issue.
Finally, there is organisational slippage, where many senior leaders focus less on leadership and more on data, KPIs and delivery. Daily, they live and operate outside of the leadership space. Often due to the culture, lack of clarity on their leadership purpose, or having no plans around their own leadership. Or they donât realise the importance of leadership. Ironically, if quality leadership was a priority the this would help to improve the data, KPIs and delivery⊠Go figureâŠ
Change the leadership, or change the leadership
I often use the phrase in workshops âchange the man or change the manâ to reflect the options leaders have around improvement. The same is brought to organisational leadership. âChange the leadership or change the leadershipâ. This will be construed in a few ways:
- Senior leaders identifying the leadership necessary for their organisation and setting that standard for it to happen
- Similarly, senior leaderâs role modelling âgoodâ leadership and firmly embedded expectations and accountability in others to also role model this
- Investing in leader’s development (at all levels) to ensure consistent skills and behaviours are throughout the organisation
- Finally, making the tough decision to replace those leaders not demonstrating the qualities, skills and values required. Where is the greater risk to the organisation, having these leaders in place or letting them go?
How to be different around organisational leadership
To change leadership there has to be a holistic and deliberate approach to change it. Starting at the top.
- The SLT team defines and shapes what leadership will look like and how it will be experienced
- Agree how this leadership will be achieved
- How will the SLT, need to be as leaders and as a leadership team from the get go?
- The values, behaviours or leadership competencies to be exhibited across the organisation. This shapes your âgoodâ organisational leadership. Competencies are useful, there are pages of competencies on Google. You donât need to invest time or energy defining your own. Correspondingly, having them is one thing, developing accountability around them for leaders is another. Itâs the accountability that needs to be in place. Often, Identifying and doing 3-4 competencies well for the year provides a better focus than trying to do 15 competencies poorly. Evolve them every year.
- What development will be in place for ALL leaders to achieve this?
- How will you build the behaviours and expectations into policy and strategy?
- Build in expectations around leaders into induction and probation periods for leaders
- Incorporating competencies or values into organisational appraisals, building in measurement and accountability.
- Highlighting examples of good and poor leadership practice
- Having performance conversations around poor leadership
- Regularly reviewing the âhealthâ of the organisations leadership and make changes.
None of this has to be overcomplicated, it will take time and has to have a coherent and cohesive plan. Ideally, overtly sponsored by the SLT. Similarly, there must be the opportunity for the CEO, MD and others in the organisation to hold the SLT to account
Do yourself, your leaders and your organisation a favour, âchange the leadershipâ. Create a revolution in leadership in your organisation, or, at the very least, in the conversation around leadership.
Let’s have a conversation…
Nick Howell is an established leadership Facilitator, Coach and Author of Great Coaching Questions, working with individual and organisations to bring difference and growth to people. Contact Nick now for a conversation about your leadership and being a point of difference for your people. Either for you as an individual leader and your growth or, for your organisation