Leadership Perspectives

“Authentic Leadership”

Paul HealyHead of Group Learning & Development

Irish Life & PermanentThe Sales Institute 20th October 2010

Traditional Leadership Theory

• Trait V Behavioral

• Leadership “Styles”

• Situational Leadership Theory

• Managers V Leaders

What has Changed?

• Customer ?

• Market ?

• People– Task of engaging employees has changed.– “Increasingly suspicious that we are been ‘worked’”

(Goffee & Jones)– Employers have broken bond of trust– Vets, Baby Boomers, Gen X and Gen Y– Rise of the corporate prisoner.

Contemporary Perspectives

• 3 Themes– Context– Conviction – Authentic Leadership

• Emphasis Shift– From the Leader to the Followers

2 Contemporary Ideas

Adaptive Leadership(Heifetz / O’Doherty)

“Level 5” Leaders(Jim Collins)

Authority

• Direction

• Protection

• Order

• Direction

• Protection

Order

• Orientation to roles

• Control of conflict

• Maintain norms

Leadership

• Leadership is an Activity

• Not defined by personality traits, charisma, power, influence or position

• With or Without Authority

LEADERSHIP

• The capacity to mobilize people to address the tough problems – those they would rather avoid

Technical Work

Any work that doesn't require deep thinking or systemic change, but is straight-forward in regards to the application of expertise to a particular problem. The problem is clear and the solution is clear.

Adaptive Work

• The challenging work of shifting values, norms, belief systems and world views so that progress can be made on problems that don’t have easy answers and that people would rather avoid.

SStakeholders

Requires Learning

Requires Learning

Adaptive

Authority & Stakeholders

Requires Learning

Clear Technical & Adaptive

Authority Clear Clear Technical

Focus of Work

Solution Definition

Problem Definition

Kind of Work

Properties of an Adaptive Challenge

• The challenge consists of a gap between aspirations and reality.

• Requires responses outside the normal repertoire.

• Narrowing the gap requires difficult learning. • The learning involves distinguishing what’s

expendable from what’s essential, which involves LOSS.

Properties of an Adaptive Challenge

• The losses often involve learning to refashion old loyalties and develop new competencies

• Adaptive work is value-laden• The people with the problem are the

problem and the solution– Problem solving responsibility shifts to

the stakeholders

Properties of an Adaptive Challenge

• Adaptive work requires a longer time frame than technical work

• Adaptive work is experimental in nature.

• Adaptive challenges generate disequilibrium and avoidance.

“The problems that we have created by the way that we have lived cannot be solved at the same level of thinking that produced them in the first place.”

Albert Einstein

19

Source: Based on Heifetz, Leadership without Easy Answers

Level of disequilibrium

Time

Learning zone

Comfort zone

Danger zone

Managing Stress Responses

Technical Work

• Authority provides problem definition & solution

• Protects from external threat

• Restates/ Orientates roles

• Restores Order

• Maintains norms

Adaptive Work• Authority identifies the

challenge, diagnoses the condition, produces questions about solution

• Discloses external threat

• Disorientates roles, resists pressure to orient people in new roles too quickly

• Exposes conflict or lets it emerge

• Challenges norms, allow norms to be challenged

Work Avoidance

• Make the problem Technical

• Blame Authority

• Kill the Messenger

• Scapegoat/externalize the problem

The Tasks of Leadership

• Get on the Balcony• Define the Adaptive Challenge• Infuse the Work with Meaning• Keep the level of stress (disequilibrium)

productive• Focus on ripening the issue• Develop responsibility/give work back to the

stakeholders• Think Politically

Level 5 LeadershipJim Collins

“ You can accomplish anything in life, provided that you do not mind who gets the credit.”

Harry Truman

Jim Collins

• Wrote “Built to Last”

• Wrote “Good to Great”– Study of 1435 Good Companies– Examined their performance over 40 years– Companies that outpaced the rest of the

industry (exceeded the stock market av by 3x over 15 years)

Who is Darwin Smith?

• In-house lawyer who was CEO of Kimberly-Clark for 20 years

• During his time Kimberly-Clark generated stock returns 4.1 times the general market

• He described his management style as “Eccentric”

• His shyness was coupled with a fierce resolve toward life.

Level 5 Leaders

Level 5 leaders channel their ego needs away from themselves and into the larger goal of building a great company. It’s not that Level 5 leaders have no ego or self-

interest. Indeed, they are incredibly ambitious—but their ambition is first and

foremost for the institution, not themselves.

Who is Colman Mockler

• CEO of Gillette from 1975 to 1991

• A gracious, patrician gentleman

• Held off three hostile attacks in order to fight for the future greatness of Gillette

• A placid persona that held an inner intensity to be the best

Who of these do you know?

• George Cain(Abbott Medical)

• Alan Wurtzel(Circuit City)

• Jim Herring

(Kroger)

• Carl Reichardt(Wells Fargo)

• Lyle Everingham(Nucor)

• Joe Cullman(Philip Morris)

• Fred Allan(Pitney Bowes)

• Charles Walgreen(Walgreen Pharm)

Why “Level 5”

Level 2

Level 3

Level 4

Level 5

Level 1 Highly Capable Individual

Contributing Team Member

Competent Manager

Effective Leader

Level 5 Executive

= Humility + Will

Two Dimensions of Level 5

• Professional Will

– Creates superb results, a clear catalyst in the transition from good to great

– Demonstrates an unwavering resolve to do whatever must be done to produce the best long-term results, no matter how difficult.

- Sets the standard of building an enduring great company; will settle for nothing less.

- Looks in the mirror, not out the window, to apportion responsibility for poor results.

The Second Side

• Personal Humility– Demonstrates a

compelling modesty, shunning public adulation; never boastful.

– Acts with quiet, calm determination; relies principally on inspired standards, not inspiring charisma, to motivate

– Channels ambition into the company, not the self; sets up successors for even greater success in the next generation.

– Looks out the window, not the mirror, to apportion credit for the success of the company.

Level 5 Conundrum

• The great irony is that the personal ambition that often drive people to positions of power stands at odds with the humility required for Level 5 leadership.

• Combine that irony with the fact that boards of directors frequently operate under the false belief that they need to hire a larger-than-life egocentric leader.

Therefore:

• You can see why Level 5 leaders seldom appear at the top of institutions.

• The problem is not with the availability of Level 5 leaders. The problem is recognising that what they have is important.

Finally!

• Can I become a Level 5 leader?

• No prescription---sorry. Except to practice the other findings that lead a company from Good to Great.– Disciplined People– Disciplined Thought– Disciplined Action