Culture drives behavior. In most organizations, producers are almost assured of promotion into people leadership roles, which often trumps the need for effective team leadership. Producers have become leaders all, with predictably good, bad and ugly results.
Research suggests that effective organizational leadership and optimal productivity requires a focus on teams rather than individuals in order to leverage the unique, but limited talent set of each producer. In high-performing teams, leadership emerges, even in rigid cultures.
The root cause of systemic leadership problems, then, is cultural--where hierarchy promotes non-leaders into leadership roles, and where structures and behaviors are not well-aligned with the strategy. Given the strength of entrenched cultures, the only way to successfully promote new attitudes and behaviors, e.g., risk-taking and simplification in a high control, risk-averse culture, is to complement senior leadership changes and team-focused performance with "catalytic mechanisms.” While leadership programs may act as both a temporary energizer and sedative (we are actually doing something about this!), they can't solve leadership problems. In place of real change comes increasing cynicism and disengagement.
We help companies identify the appropriate behaviors and mechanisms that will need to be put in place to create alignment, and our assessment tools effectively measure progress.
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