Taking Lessons From The Teacher

We are well into the school year, a good time to focus attention on and give gratitude to the educators of tomorrow's leaders. Teachers deserve admiration for regularly facing classrooms of pupils with vast differences and needs, and still managing to fill young minds with the knowledge that turns them into productive citizens and creative thinkers.

Some of today's pupils will eventually land at the doorsteps of industry and business, eager to perform. In the ideal scenario, some of the best employees will become high-performing CEOs and CFOs, executive directors, or hold other highly responsible positions of leadership. But for this ideal to occur, learning must be a lifetime pursuit and teaching, or development, must meet individual needs.  

In too many organisations, this does not happen. Employee development programs are often like ordering from a menu that offers a single entrée, no substitutions permitted, and everyone has to like it. In development classes, this means that managers with different needs will join others both like and unlike them, to study the same things – customer service, perhaps, or team building, or leadership in general – whether they need these sessions or not. Organisers of such programs should glance into the room at mid-point and see how many pupils are engaged in the subject. If you see vacant stares, doodling and finger drumming, take it as a sign that your development needs an infusion of relevance and reality.

The First Step
One of the most effective things a leader can do when developing employees is find out what they need. Asking, "In what area(s) do you need to grow?" is simple enough. But just because the question is easy does not mean the answer is at our fingertips. Everyone has blind spots, and all ambitious employees want to present themselves in the best possible light. For example, don't expect someone to tell you that she is good at everything except for establishing relationships. Many people just do not want to admit that a skill or two might be weak. Even those who know where they need to improve might not be willing or able to articulate it clearly.

This is where an objective assessment can be a useful method of determining exactly what your employees need to develop into a great leader. Let's define an "objective assessment" as a measure of on-the-job behaviours or skills required to perform the job. A list of these skills could be quite long and include such things as displaying commitment, an ability to develop teams, skill in motivating team members, and the constant fly in the organisational ointment, effective delegation of duties to others.

Such a list can seem endless, but that does not mean it must intimidate. One of Profiles' assessments designed to develop managers looks at 18 important areas or skills sets. Even with its detailed examination, it takes only a short time to finish and can be completed online, in the privacy of the employee's home or office. Such assessments are scientifically designed to obtain responses that are honest and clear.

After the Assessment
If we were in a classroom, we'd ask for a show of hands in response to this next question, and we'd expect to see few fingers in the air: How many organisations actually DO something with assessments once the employee has completed them? Here's another question: Are the assessments designed for action?  

We envision a classroom full of shoulders shrugging about now.

One of the mysteries common to many offices has to do with the Bermuda Triangle of amassed information. Self-studies, projects, reports and assessments gather dust on shelves or get lost in the bottom of a pile on a desk. People get busy with phone calls, day-to-day duties and out of town conferences, and then they go on holiday for a couple of weeks. Soon the valuable information about Jim or Sally's ability to communicate with team members is lost.

We believe truly helpful assessments come with easy-to-follow next steps. The same assessment described earlier comes with action reports, one for the employee who completed the assessment, and one for his or her supervisor or on-the-job coach. The manager's assessment is a self-study. Like any good diagnostic, it reveals which measurements the manager excels at, what the organisation needs, and what the manager needs to work on.

The coach's assessment comes with a report on the employee, as well as exercises and activities for the coach to assign. Designed for employee growth, this report is like a tailored suit – it fits perfectly. If you knew something was missing on Sally's team but could not define what the ingredient was, this report will tell you. Perhaps the missing link is effective communication, or maybe Sally is not listening to team members as carefully as she should be. Whatever the case, the coach's report will say so – and the coach will know how to help Sally shore up these weaknesses in performance.

Life provides us with valuable educational milestones: moving from primary school into high school, graduating from high school, finishing university and advanced degrees. But such milestones do not signify an end to learning. Each one puts us on a new path to something new. Just ask any teacher.                                           

FROM JIM SIRBASKU’S DESK 

* From the book 40 STRATEGIES FOR WINNING IN BUSINESS by Bud Haney and Jim Sirbasku. © S&H Publishing Co. All rights reserved.     

IN THIS ISSUE

Taking Lessons From the Teacher

10 Things Good Leaders Do (And How They Do Them)

Product Focus:
A Blackboard Exercise on SkillBuilder™ 

Strategies for Winning:
Delegate For Success

PRODUCT OF THE MONTH    

The CheckPoint 360 System is a powerful three-part solution for a manager's professional development:  

1. Checkpoint 360 Degree Survey provides managers with multi-rater feedback from those who observe their performance: their bosses, subordinates, and peers. This is an important process because increased awareness motivates managers to change the way they do their jobs. 

2. Organizational Management Analysis System that alerts top management to potential managerial problems that can develop when managers’ goals are not in alignment with the goals of the organisation. It can strengthen communication and builds stronger organisations. 

3. Skill Builder Series  rounds out the 360 degree feedback solution and is an organised management and professional development program that addresses specific managerial skills identified in the Checkpoint as needing improvement. Consisting of 18 modules, managers develop and complete a customised personal development plan using SkillBuilder modules which are available online self paced and are easily integrated into a manager’s schedule and tangibly accelerate effectiveness and efficiency. 

Until Nov 30th 2008, for every Checkpoint 360 Survey ordered we will provide a complimentary SkillBuilder module. 

QUOTES OF THE MONTH

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