Leadership Development: a K-M-A-A?
(Our Grandfathers say the darndest things...)
By Kevin O’Farrell, CHRP, Founder and Managing Partner, Crekof Inc.
My grandfather was a 3rd generation Irish-Canadian who continued to channel some of the most colourful expressions from the old country. One of my personal favourites was hearing him bluster about a ‘‘kiss-me-arse-affair’’ (K-M-A-A). This was a term he used judiciously, yet always with a scathing tone to describe a botched, mismanaged and overall unsatisfactory outcome, as in, ‘‘I drove all that distance to that damn funeral and they didn’t even serve a lunch after the service-It was just a kiss-me-arse affair.’’ In other words, significant effort was expended with little recognition derived and even basic needs not having been met.
As an observer of (and participant in) organizational management for over 30 years I have come to the unfortunate conclusion that much of what passes for leadership development could be described as a ‘‘K-M-A-A’’: Often mismanaged, misdirected and unsatisfactory, for both the individual and the organization. Coming from someone like me, who has toiled as an HR and business consultant and executive, this may just sound like a rant, pining for the good old days. But in this case, the old days may have been no better than the current. Maybe worse.
I know there are notable exceptions; particularly brilliant examples of eras or ‘‘moment-in time’’ initiatives in particular companies where leadership development achieved stellar results. I also know that, by hook or by crook, some organizations have produced a disproportionate share of certain types of successful leaders.
But in the overall scheme of things, consider the gallons of ink and the megabytes of memory consumed by the gazillion writings devoted to the subject of leadership and leadership development. (Yes, just add this one to the pile!)
Every day on LinkedIn alone there are hundreds of exchanges and numerically-anchored recipes for leadership (The one thing you need to know about.., The top 2 ways…, the 10 commandments of… etc.). Beyond the age-old question of nature vs. nurture, we are inundated with well-thought-out academic treatises and crack-pot theories about how to identify, develop and capitalize on different types of leadership.
So, in spite of all this wisdom, why have so many well-intentioned efforts turned into K-M-A-A’s? Several observations come to mind.
It is really hard to predict the leadership that will be required in the future.
Leadership is often defined relative to what is already known. New leadership is easier defined as requiring more of or less of what we already have now in the current person or team in place. With ubiquitous change being an exponentially volatile variable in business today, how can we realistically and adequately identify and prepare future leadership? It can be done, but only if we replace certainty with contingency, firmness with flexibility and envision various scenarios and strategies to match with the needs of emerging times. This may mean preparing very distinct profiles of leadership in a perspective of a balanced portfolio that controls explicitly for certain types of identified risk, to be played out as realities take shape.
And they shall form them in their own image and likeness…
Coupled with the first challenge is the reality that current leaders typically want clones. It takes a big man or woman to go beyond the ‘‘ I’m OK-you’re not OK’’ syndrome and recognize the flaws or weaknesses in their own leadership. Companies that build their own leadership models, develop their own capability and competency maps, engage in their own programs run the risk of creating a mirror effect that will perpetuate a form of leadership that frankly, may be wrong for the sustainability and growth of the organization. Companies that take a cafeteria approach, picking and choosing piecemeal options delivered without a coherent overall plan can end up with leadership development indigestion.
One way to contain this tendency is for organizations to purposely go out of their way to seek the clash of ideas, the proverbial out-of-the box challenges that stimulate innovation and question the status quo. And then to blend these with the most desirable elements of the culture and the corporate DNA that needs to be preserved. Successful leadership development is a meaningful exercise of institutional and individual self-awareness applied to the objective requirements of the organization, not the need for ego-driven self-perpetuation.
In the long run, we are all dead.
A very wise man, a former VP of Executive Compensation, ironically now deceased, was once asked how he designed long-term incentives. ‘‘ As short as possible,’’ he replied. ‘‘How do I know that we’ll still want these people around in 5 years?’’
By definition, leadership development is all about the long haul. It is about the accumulation of experiences, skills and competencies that enable clear-headed decision-making and foster organizational growth. However, this confirms the need for a temporal dimension that should be made more explicit in the development of leadership and more broadly of talent.
Every year, millions of dollars are spent (invested?) in leadership development. It deserves to be much more than a K-M-A-A.