Leadership Development Your Company Can Afford…Even This Year!
Leadership Development Your Company Can Afford…Even This Year!
I knew that I needed to start building a solid pipeline of future talent, and I quickly learned that while I had “support” for the effort, there would be very little money to spend on it. Sound familiar?
Of course it does. It’s the challenge HR professionals always face, especially when the expected payback from an investment is down the road a ways.
Back then, most companies used commercially-available training programs to develop their managers. I knew there were lots to choose from, and that some were pretty good, but also pretty expensive, which was going to be a problem.
At about that time, an article appeared in the Wall Street Journal about another financial services company that was doing development quite differently. They were building improvement plans that had their managers trying new behaviors on the job, using their teams as learning labs. Unlike most other companies at that time, they weren’t sending managers away to expensive week-long programs in distant cities, hoping they’d return “fixed.”
As I talked with that company, I learned that their model was based on some research conducted at the Center for Creative Leadership in Greensboro, NC. The research revealed that extraordinary managers believed that the things they learned along the way came from three sources, in these proportions:
1. Schools and Seminars - 10%
2. Other People - 20%
3. Things They Learned On The Job – 70%
The developmental approach this other company was taking was patterned after the research finding, and it didn’t cost a lot of money.
Soon thereafter, we were underway, using facilitated 360-degree feedback to heighten self-awareness and provide motivation based on performance gaps. We identified those gaps by looking at the raters responses to two questions:
1. How would you rate or describe the Learner on this competency?
2. How important is this competency to success in this position?
The feedback process grouped the answers in thirds, so that a competency would be considered top-, middle- or bottom-third as to Performance and Importance. Gaps were apparent when a competency was viewed as top third in Importance, but only middle or bottom third in Performance.
Managers selected three competencies for development during the subsequent two years and were provided with resources that showed them just what to do to get better at each. Accountability is important, and these managers had to report on their progress quarterly, with 20% of their bonus at risk for failure to do the work in their plan by the end of the two years.
From the first round of feedback, we were able to capture the competencies most important for success in all of our managerial positions, so in subsequent biannual feedback sessions, we could compare how a manager was doing on the competencies most important for success for the current position, as well as those most important for potential future roles. That allowed for “building the bench” by creating the strengths that a manager would need to succeed in the future.
How do you measure the results of such a program? With programs like this it can be tough to get good measures, but I think the best indicator is organizational performance. During the last five years, that organization posted the best results of its 95-year history. While I can’t put an exact number on it, I have no doubt that having an effective leadership development program that produced a management team well-prepared to take on the challenges it faced contributed to those results in a meaningful way.
This strategic HR solution to one company’s bench strength problem had affordable costs, required no travel, and produced great results. It was ideal for those tough times a few years ago, and it’s just as practical and effective in 2009.
Leadership Development Your Company Can AffordEven This Year - To learn more about this author, visit Clarke Peterson's Website.
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It was the mid-90s, and we were in an economic slump; not nearly as bad as right now, but enough to tightly restrain corporate budgets. I was the VP of Human Resources for a financial services company of about 1300 with ten offices around the US. One day, I was looking at demographic data with our organizational chart in hand, and what it told me was that we were in trouble. We had way too many baby boomers in managerial and executive roles who would all be retiring at about the same time, with few apparent successors in the pipeline.
I knew that I needed to start building a solid pipeline of future talent, and I quickly learned that while I had “support” for the effort, there would be very little money to spend on it. Sound familiar?
Of course it does. It’s the challenge HR professionals always face, especially when the expected payback from an investment is down the road a ways.
Back then, most companies used commercially-available training programs to develop their managers. I knew there were lots to choose from, and that some were pretty good, but also pretty expensive, which was going to be a problem.
At about that time, an article appeared in the Wall Street Journal about another financial services company that was doing development quite differently. They were building improvement plans that had their managers trying new behaviors on the job, using their teams as learning labs. Unlike most other companies at that time, they weren’t sending managers away to expensive week-long programs in distant cities, hoping they’d return “fixed.”
As I talked with that company, I learned that their model was based on some research conducted at the Center for Creative Leadership in Greensboro, NC. The research revealed that extraordinary managers believed that the things they learned along the way came from three sources, in these proportions:
1. Schools and Seminars - 10%
2. Other People - 20%
3. Things They Learned On The Job – 70%
The developmental approach this other company was taking was patterned after the research finding, and it didn’t cost a lot of money.
Soon thereafter, we were underway, using facilitated 360-degree feedback to heighten self-awareness and provide motivation based on performance gaps. We identified those gaps by looking at the raters responses to two questions:
1. How would you rate or describe the Learner on this competency?
2. How important is this competency to success in this position?
The feedback process grouped the answers in thirds, so that a competency would be considered top-, middle- or bottom-third as to Performance and Importance. Gaps were apparent when a competency was viewed as top third in Importance, but only middle or bottom third in Performance.
Managers selected three competencies for development during the subsequent two years and were provided with resources that showed them just what to do to get better at each. Accountability is important, and these managers had to report on their progress quarterly, with 20% of their bonus at risk for failure to do the work in their plan by the end of the two years.
From the first round of feedback, we were able to capture the competencies most important for success in all of our managerial positions, so in subsequent biannual feedback sessions, we could compare how a manager was doing on the competencies most important for success for the current position, as well as those most important for potential future roles. That allowed for “building the bench” by creating the strengths that a manager would need to succeed in the future.
How do you measure the results of such a program? With programs like this it can be tough to get good measures, but I think the best indicator is organizational performance. During the last five years, that organization posted the best results of its 95-year history. While I can’t put an exact number on it, I have no doubt that having an effective leadership development program that produced a management team well-prepared to take on the challenges it faced contributed to those results in a meaningful way.
This strategic HR solution to one company’s bench strength problem had affordable costs, required no travel, and produced great results. It was ideal for those tough times a few years ago, and it’s just as practical and effective in 2009.
Leadership Development Your Company Can AffordEven This Year - To learn more about this author, visit Clarke Peterson's Website.
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John PowerJohn Power, founder of Biltmore Franchise Consulting, has extensive experience developing and marketing franchises and business opportunities. He has been in and around franchising for over twenty years. From 1980 through 1990 he conceptualized, organized, and developed the American Video Association. He grew AVA to 2,000 national members, before selling the company it 1990. It was later merged into another home video marketing company. From 2000 to 2005 he worked as a contract marketing and human resources consultant to several local and national companies. In 2005 Mr. Power began working as a franchise development consultant on a full-time basis. Since that time he has helped more than three dozen companies initiate and develop their franchising program. He notes that there are many companies interested in developing a franchise program, and who need his specialized assistance. Mr. Power is a “hands-on” franchise consultant. He said, “I am the ‘nuts and bolts’ person who tends to the details for my clients.” Mr. Power holds a B.S. degree with a major in Marketing. See: www.biltmorefranchise.com You may contact Mr. Power at: jpower@biltmorefranchise.co - Visit John Power's Website |
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John BrennanJohn Brennan Ed.D. Dr. Brennan is President of Interpersonal Development, LLC, a training and development firm. Interpersonal Development has provided sales training and coaching to more than 3,000 sales reps from over 100 companies. A native of Australia, Dr. Brennan received his doctorate from the University of Rochester. His dissertation researched the effectiveness of Behavioral Modeling Technology in training people in interpersonal skills. While he has spent most of his career designing or delivering training, he was also a Vice-President of Sales of a training and development franchise with operations in 25 markets. Dr. Brennan has designed and delivered sales training in North America, Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. He has been a guest speaker at numerous national and regional professional conferences. When Microsoft wanted Best Practices articles on sales for their web site, they called Dr. Brennan. The results are at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX011387391033.aspx His firm’s clients have included Volvo, The Prudential, Merrill Lynch, Eastman Kodak, Gannett, Equifax Europe, the Economist Group and countless small businesses. - Visit John Brennan's Website |
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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Linda RichardsonLinda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website |
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Dianne CramptonDianne Crampton is an executive leadership coach, team consultant, author and president of TIGERS Success Series, Inc. Dianne has been helping CEO's and Executives connect their employees to their core values and goals for over 20 years using the trademarked TIGERS team culture process, which stands for trust, interdependence, genuineness, empathy, risk and success. To download a free white paper on behaviors that build strong teams and behaviors that will predictably tear them down go here. - Visit Dianne Crampton's Website |
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Jeff FosterWebBizIdeas.com is a Minneapolis website design company founded to help people start an internet business by providing them with website, business, and internet resources that help foster the growth of successful online businesses and develop innovative Internet business ideas. We specialize in internet consulting & internet marketing. - Visit Jeff Foster's Website |
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Cheryl MatthynssensCheryl is a life skills coach, licensed Chemical Dependency Counselor and a 20 year entrepreneur. Cheryl's dedication to achieving a life of balance led to her expanding her teaching from the simple managing of life's daily challenges to adding financial well being as well. A direct marketer with DrinkACT, she is gaining ground in the online community with her concepts of making sure business owners, entreprenuers and employees have well rounded life styles. She opened up a small affiliate site - The Balance Guide- to help others find resources for mental and emotional well being. Visit Cheryl's blog to see more of the diversity beyond business she has began offering online at www.thebalanceguide.blogspot.com - Visit Cheryl Matthynssens's Website |
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Anne BarrAnne Barr has over 26 years experience in sales and marketing, six years as a franchisee. She has assisted over 367 business owners and purchasers to achieve their goals in career change, transition and exit strategy. She holds the designation of Certified Franchise Executive from the International Franchise Association, Certified Business Intermediary from the International Business Brokers Association and Board Certified Broker from the Texas Association of Business Brokers. Anne is active in professional organizations, networking groups and volunteers for non-profit entities. As owner/operator of four successful businesses, Anne has proven people skills and enjoys helping clients find the right "fit" in business ownership. Visit www.FranchiseOpportunitySpecialist.com for more information about me and my company. - Visit Anne Barr's Website |
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