Develop Leaders Internally (Principle)

The program leader faces a particularly challenging task in promoting this principle. In a nutshell, he or she will be dictating to the senior staff not only who they hire, but how they spend their time.

Many senior leaders spend far too few hours of the week developing their subordinates…and their own replacements. For some, it is just not a priority. They have a lot on their plate, and they just don’t emphasize mentoring. For others, though, it is actually a conscious decision.

Some leaders are insecure, and don’t want to create competition for themselves. They don’t want to give their boss a viable alternative. The reality is that leaders who fall into this category are…

The main problem with failing to develop a leadership funnel is cost. First of all, there are recruiting costs. While all hiring activities have some costs associated with them, the costs rise in lockstep with the seniority of the position. At high levels these costs are often in the form of headhunter fees. But if the recruiting is done by the HR department, there can still be considerable expense in finding and hiring the right person. Generally speaking, the higher up somebody is an organization the more effort must be spent hiring them. A greater number of candidates are interviewed by larger interview teams. This is a direct function of the higher risk of a poor hiring decision.

Further, because hiring senior-level leaders is not an everyday activity, it creates spikes in demand which are hard for the human resources department to manage. That variable workload can be disruptive to the flow of the recruiting process at all levels.

The second major cost comes in the form of retraining. As strong as an external leader is, he or she will still not have a thorough understanding of how things are done within your organization. That means it can be a challenge for them to hit the ground running.

The final large cost is associated with mis-hired personnel. Hiring externally is a far greater gamble than hiring from within the organization. To add insult to injury, when a person is mis-hired, the whole recruiting process has to start over again.

For these reasons developing an internal funnel to cultivate leaders can significantly reduce your costs of building a strong management team.

“Develop Leaders Internally” is the rule associated with the principle that actively managing the growth of current and future leaders within the company will reduce the impact of poor leadership on your continuous improvement efforts.

There are three main components to developing a strong leadership funnel. The first is identifying the future leadership needs of the organization. The second is to identify candidates from within the company who can eventually fill those needs. The third and final component is developing the potential leaders that you identified. Obviously, shortages of internal candidates means that external candidates will be required to close the gaps.

Keep in mind that the funnel does not stop for an individual when they get promoted to a new position. That person may have been identified to become…

The rest of this section is only available as part of a premium product. Licenses are available at our store.

The program leader faces a particularly challenging task in promoting this principle. In a nutshell, he or she will be dictating to the senior staff not only who they hire, but how they spend their time.

Many senior leaders spend far too few hours of the week developing their subordinates…and their own replacements. For some, it is just not a priority. They have a lot on their plate, and they just don’t emphasize mentoring. For others, though, it is actually a conscious decision.

Some leaders are insecure, and don’t want to create competition for themselves. They don’t want to give their boss a viable alternative. The reality is that leaders who fall into this category are…

The rest of this section is only available as part of a premium product. Licenses are available at our store.

• Be aware of the perception of unfairness. The people in the leadership funnel will be given more opportunities to do things outside of their normal job description. This can be perceived as favoritism.
• A leadership funnel can be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Once a person is identified as a potential leader, there is more…

The rest of this section is only available as part of a premium product. Licenses are available at our store.