Developing Senior Leadership

Senior leaders are the visible faces of any organization. These leaders are responsible for building, communicating and retaining the vision and strategic direction of the company. Employees’ belief in senior leadership is a critical ingredient for successful and sustainable employee engagement. When employees believe in and trust their senior leaders, companies are more likely to have a higher level of organizational engagement. We know that leaders who keep learning and growing are ultimate source of sustainable competitive advantage. Too often, leadership programs are viewed as irrelevant, too theoretical and disconnected from the leader's job and the whole experience is often very poorly designed and executed.

In order for senior leadership to be effective, they must possess some key qualities.

• The leaders involved must be able to recognize that the leadership skills, practices and knowledge being taught are important for them to learn and follow.
• Senior leaders must be business-focused and closely connected to the issues and challenges they face as leaders. They must be goal-oriented and focus on achieving target as per organization’s vision.
• Leaders must be able to provide reliable assessments of their teams and provide unbiased feedback as skilled coaches to help their teams interpret the data and develop realistic improvement and development plans.

Different business challenges, market conditions and unique strategies require different kinds of leadership. Following are certain factors that can be critical while developing Senior Leadership:

• Time frame – The speed with which organizations need to revise strategies, launch new products and services, and expand their global impression is continuously rising. Rapid means of enabling the organization and its leaders to make these changes are required from the development function.
• Share of mind – Executives are incredibly taxed with an increasing set of responsibilities; mid-level management has been reduced and the number of stakeholders has increased, all putting incredible pressure on leaders. Development and involvement that is not of immediate and high value, risks elimination.
• Budget – The current economic situation has put great pressure on all expenses across the organization, and executive development is no exception.
• "Bottom line" Talent Acquisition Game – As many organizations have become more result oriented and need qualitative approach for all support functions, there is increased pressure on Talent Acquisition and Retention to "raise its game" and prove their incredible value to the organization.

The ability to attract and retain superior intellectual capital is a primary source of competitive advantage. Leaders are best measured by the results they achieve. To design and deliver development processes that assure capabilities which are available when needed, factors like performance management, learning processes and programs, retention, and succession planning play a vital role.