As a speaker and a consultant, He travels all over the country facilitating leadership development programs. One of the first questions He asks in his program is, "how many people have reported to a bad manager in their career?" Unfortunately (and He would even argue predictably) usually about 90 percent of the people in the room raise their hand. Why is that? Because He believes that most companies make massive mistakes when it comes to how they handle leadership development in their organizations. He sees it at every size company, in the world of nonprofit and in government agencies. Here are the biggest mistakes He sees companies make and how to solve them.
Mistake No. 1: They support people who have technical competency and they assume they have leadership skills. I see so many organizations who support a person because they were good at their job. They were good at IT, so companies assume that they will also make a good IT manager. Why do they do that? It is such a crazy presumption because the skills required to do the job are nowhere near the same skills needed to lead and manage people. Of course the person who got promoted will not admit that they don't know, they will just do the best they can and they will either sink or swim. Sadly, far too often they sink.
Solution: Don't suppose people know how to lead. Provide coaching and development for all new managers to teach them how to lead productively.
Mistake No. 2: We let senior leaders get away with not committing to their own development. When I conduct leadership programs, the people running the programs almost always inform me that the Vice Presidents in the company will not be joining the program. When I asked why, they tell me in a very frustrated tone that the senior leaders don't believe that they need additional leadership development, and they are just too busy. I have found that some people in senior leadership roles can create massive egos and don't believe they need to boost or grow. Wrong! This is also an example of terrible leadership role modeling. Senior leaders insist that their managers go to leadership training, but they don't go themselves. In one program that I conducted, a very savvy CEO took the training as a student in order to demonstrate how crucial it was to commit to leadership development.
Solution: The CEO of the company should require that every person in a leadership or management role should commit to leadership development every year. It should be a requirement, not an option.
Mistake No. 3: There are no examinations or testing of leadership skills and abilities. Many times when I talk to clients who want to do leadership development, they have already selected a list of topics that they want to cover. When I ask how these topics were selected, they say they got together with the group and decided what it was that people needed. My question to that is always "how do you know?" In my opinion you can't do efficient leadership development unless you assess where people are in their skill sets. How do you know what they need unless you test their knowledge skills and abilities?
Solution: Put into place efficient data driven leadership assessments, so the training can be tailored to exactly what it is that people need, not what the company thinks they need.
Mistake No. 4: Not willing to commit the time for leadership development. Many times in organizations people tell me that they would like to attend my leadership development program, but they can't. When I ask why, they tell me that they are too busy, and their manager will not let them attend the program because there's too much work to be done. This is a very shortsighted strategy, and it is also a vicious cycle. The person in a leadership role is working very hard and because they're working very hard they're not able to go to the leadership development program. Because they're not getting leadership development they're not getting better at what they do and have a hard time increasing their performance or effectiveness as a leader.
Solution: If we want people to be effective leaders, no matter how busy they are, we have to invest time for their leadership development.
Mistake No. 5: Assuming that leadership development is an event and not a process. I often find it hilarious when companies send their leaders to one day leadership development training programs. The company is expecting that leader will learn and apply new skills from the program. But the reality is learning should not be an event, it should be a process and often that is where the training fails, because there is no system.
Solution: When conducting leadership development programs there needs to be pre-assignments, the class itself, and then comprehensive follow-up processes to make sure that they apply what they understood.
Mistake No. 6: The managers are not dedicated to their direct report's development. I often hear a sad story from someone in my leadership program, who went back the next day to work, and had their manager completely ignore the fact that they attended class. They don't ask how class went, they don't ask what they learned, they don't do any follow-up whatsoever because they are so busy doing the work. When people that are in the leadership program try to apply their action plans, the manager tells them that they don't have the time and they need to get back to work. It is impossible for a leader to develop effectively if they don't get support from the person that they report to and worse, actually get resistance from them. This sends a terrible message program because it tells them that it's really not important.
Solution: Make sure that when your company does leadership development, it involves not only the people who are in the class, but the people who they report to because they are an integral part of the entire process.
Take a hard look at your organization, and ask yourself-- are you dedicating any of these mistakes in developing your leaders? Some simple course corrections can make the difference between highly effective leaders those who aren't. The decision is yours.
Autor: Shawn Doyle
Source: HuffingtonPost.com
