We worked closely with a group of senior leaders in a global manufacturing business. Many of the leaders ran the operation because they knew the nuts and bolts from the ground up. This left a yawning gap in the vision and direction of the business, not to mention the enrollment, engagement, education and motivation of the workforce.
These senior executives had grown up with the business, starting at the bottom, on ‘the tools’ and had learnt their trade by ‘doing the doing’ in all aspects and areas of the business.
In the team coaching interventions, all of this amazing experience and brilliant knowledge oozed out; it was a pleasure to experience such passion and attachment to their business, its products, processes and way of being.
The interrupt to this way of being came via our coaching. To a large extent, the challenge was neither enjoyed nor welcomed.
Very quickly, we were able to establish what we would describe as a firefighting or screwdriver mentality, i.e. when a fire broke out (an emergency or something out of the ordinary), the overwhelming tendency of the senior leaders was to climb on board their collective fire engine and drive as fast as they could towards the fire and put it out.
Time and time again, we come across organisations where the leaders and senior managers have come up through the organisation and cling onto their comfort zone of knowledge. Whilst it is not wrong for people to get promoted through organisations, it is wrong if they are promoted for the wrong reasons. All too often we come across senior executives who are running large sections or even huge organisations because of what they can do rather than who they can be as a leader.
These people have a very difficult task to detach themselves from being the best, most knowledgeable and most experienced ‘doer’ in the organisation. However, the great advantage of coming into an organisation from outside is that you can select the real knowledge that is required to deliver amazing results without getting bogged down in knowledge of how to actually do the job.
If you want to improve your leadership ability by enhancing your business vision, we can help. For more information, contact The Results Centre by calling 01858 414 240 or email info@theresultscentre.com.