Improving Leadership Performance

If only . . . we could improve the quality of our leadership.

Effective leadership is widely recognised as being critical to the success of all organisations. In response, organisations in the public, private and voluntary sectors often invest heavily in leadership development, whether via individually focused initiatives, as part of collective development programmes, or through team-building exercises. Despite this, the quality of leadership provided by individuals and leadership teams is still often identified as a major barrier to achieving peak organisational performance and winning the confidence of key external stakeholders.

When Common Sense Disappoints

Leadership capability and performance is a critical source of competitive advantage. Effective leadership enables more creative and risk-aware strategies to be developed, and the commitment of staff to be more effectively mobilised. Over recent years, many organisations have invested extensively in assessment- and competency based development tools to enhance this capability. Often though, whilst the intention has been positive and the processes usually well run, organisations frequently report little evidence that these have had much tangible impact on leadership performance 'on the ground'.

This is one of the puzzles of management: although interventions such as these appear to be the obvious, common sense things to do, they frequently seem to disappoint! Keith Grint, in his book Fuzzy Management captures this well, when he argues:

"Much of what is taught in management or business schools, or written about in business and management books, often appears as a banal paradox. It is banal in that it appears to regurgitate what everyone already takes for granted and knows to be true. It is a paradox because, despite being full of common sense, it doesn't seem to work."

So, if common sense doesn't work, what alternatives are there?