Discussions on leadership have a tendency to be one-directional with the focus largely on the leader rather than the led. The leader is the magician, the headline act if you will, while the employees are the faceless, doe-eyed audience passively waiting to be enchanted. Scanning the local crowd, the leader pulls out of his sleeves the tricks of his trade; power, authority, charisma and legitimacy. It is the magician alone that determines whether he kills or is killed on any given night.
But leadership is inconveniently more than a stage show with top hat, tux and slight of hand tricks. It is a relationship between people, one energized and strained by vision and trust, fear and misalignment of interests. And while leaders may attempt to impose their will on organizations, the will of the led has been known to wage battle with the best laid Machiavellian plans.
Last week the Wall Street Journal wrote a piece on the venerable camera manufacturer Leica. Once an undisputed world leader, the German company is now a minor, albeit high quality niche player in a market dominated by the likes of Canon, Sony and Kodak. In an attempt to stem the bleeding and move the firm into the digital era, in 2006 an American veteran of IBM and Best Buy was hired as CEO. What ensued was a flurry of changes to products, channels and people. What didn’t ensue was an improvement to the company’s fortunes and thus the CEO was recently ‘resigned’.
The WSJ article tries to sort through the bickering, wrongful dismissal lawsuits and conflicting storylines weaving through this ongoing story. The CEO’s camp accuses long-term employees of resisting change and engaging in a smear campaign to discredit the leader. Fearing for their jobs, these ‘underperformers’ used their seats on the supervisory board to undermine every step taken by the CEO. Supporters of the CEO lament that he was, “exactly what the company needed but he was simply not heeded”. Meanwhile, the company’s beleaguered owner stated that at the end of the day, “management’s job is to get the employees behind you”.
Also last week, Circuit City Stores ousted their CEO. Once again, despite a series of changes made to the retailer, the company’s performance failed to improve. Among the ‘blunders’ attributed to the executive was the decision to cut costs by removing high performing, senior employees. But as one individual commented, “If you worked at Circuit City, the only way to interpret it was that if you do well, you will be fired. It led to bad morale and staff disengagement”.
On the surface, underperforming century old companies, major retailers, high growth start-ups, and public sector organizations have little in common organizationally. The exception to this is the power of the led to make or break the leader. Leaders that fail to recognize this simple reality, and adjust their magic acts accordingly will find their shows cancelled in very short order. As evidenced by the daily business obituaries, many magicians simply do not have the awareness of the audience or versatility to make those adjustments.
Looking for a dynamic HR role? Stay away from the entrepreneurial tech sector.
January 1, 2012
In a recent survey of HR graduate students, the technology sector rated among the most coveted destinations to ply their trade. It is viewed as a world of innovative people, technologies and approaches where progressive talent management, OB/OD and related HR work awaits.
The Cry to Replace RIM's CEOs – A Truly Dumb Idea
October 13, 2011
Leaving aside the recent service outages, the shellacking of RIM in the press is a tad surreal to behold.
For the few Luddites not familiar with the firm, Research in Motion is the successful Canadian smart phone pioneer with revenues of $20bb per year, no debt and cash in the bank. They manufacture products that remain popular around the world and continue to boast technological innovations unmatched by any competitor. Their most recently launched smart phone devices have been well reviewed and appear to be selling well. And though the company's first version of its new tablet, the Playbook, has room for improvement, it is a promising piece of technology.
Context: When Companies Confuse Start-up Experience for Start-up Experience
October 7, 2011
I had the occasion this week to chat with an entrepreneur still licking his wounds from a stalled startup venture. His tale is a reminder of how easily companies misunderstand organizational context when hiring. For startups, such a misunderstanding can be fatal.
The CEO Hiring Practices at HP
October 3, 2011
The press tells us that Hewlett Packard is the largest technology company in the world with revenues of $126bb. Impressive as those numbers may appear, they do not seem to impress HP's Board of Directors. You see they do not believe that any of the firm's 324,600 employees are capable of leading it. Not one person. Not this year or last year when CEO changes were made. In fact they were apparently not capable six years ago or even eleven years ago when CEO changes were also made. But before summarily indicting the firm's succession planning/leadership development programs, it is useful to consider the track record of the external candidates who were considered better choices than the firm's internal candidates. This analysis decidedly shifts the spotlight to the competence of Hewlett Packard's Board of Directors.
The Folly of Believing What You Read
September 19, 2011
Some time ago we posted a blog titled ‘So you REALLY want to be a CEO?' which looked at the human costs of climbing the upper rungs of the management ladder. The blog was based on a series of articles immediately following the ‘resignation' of Pfizer CEO Jeff Kindler. All of these articles presented a cautionary tale of life in the fast lane, the long hours, the extensive global travel, and the shareholder pressures that accompany an uncooperative stock price. They also spoke poignantly of the physical and emotional toll that such unrelenting pressure took on the Pfizer CEO who eventually resigned in order to attend to his family and health. As it turns out however, much of this narrative may not have been true
Before sending us your resume (and then getting frustrated with us) ask who we work for
July 25, 2011
A friend of mine is a trustee in bankruptcy. As his title suggests, he and his firm serves those contemplating the ‘cleansing' process of personal bankruptcy. Potential customers compare service providers, select one, and then pay the chosen firm a fee to initiate and manage the ensuing process on their behalf. However, as soon as the relief-seeking customer signs on the dotted line, the trustee's allegiance shifts to the creditors for whom they then seek to maximize debt recovery. This shift in who works for whom must be a tad unsettling for people who already have a heap of problems and stress on their hands.
What Dating Services Can Teach Companies About Hiring
June 1, 2011
Executive-level hiring is a decidedly aspirational endeavor. Organizations idealize their workplace cultures, select for attributes that will fit into those romanticized environments, and then immerse unsuspecting hires into their ice-cold reality of their works-in-progress.
How to Survive a Startup - by Jill Ram
April 20, 2011
If you're an executive and you're thinking of joining a start-up, know what stage of a start-up to join. If the company is in its first year or so, don't expect to make significant changes. If you join after the company is somewhat established and mistakes have been made and learned from, you'll likely be more successful from the outset. If the founder has stepped aside, well, by then, the company is likely not considered a start-up anymore. It won't be functioning like a big company yet, and it won't have all the structure in place that it needs, but it will be run with more practicality and with less emotion. Timing is everything so choose it well.
Good News for the Old, Overqualified and Overlooked
March 18, 2011
It is expected that a significant percentage of the baby boomer generation will drive right past the Freedom 55 highway exit. For many the goal of early retirement will have proven to be unattainable hype, while for others the ups and downs of working will appear more attractive than the prospects of working up and down the local lawn bowling leadership board.
Pressed for time? Blame those Benedictine Monks.
February 24, 2011
It is among the principal reasons candidates tell us they are open to consider a change in employers. They are tethered to it, yet somehow it still flees. It is time, the most precious of resources, and for many harried executives they want some of it back.
Though their relationship with time may be strained, it is worth pointing out that it was not always this way. In his fascinating book Time Wars, Jeremy Rifkin chronicles the evolution of our modern relationship with time. He points out that in traditional agrarian and pastoral cultures, time was a very naturalistic notion maintained in cyclical, repetitive, biological and even sacred terms. The ‘passing of time' was cued via the changing seasons, biological lifecycles and lunar patterns and thus, the cadence and tempo of those societies were finely tuned to the cyclical rhythms of their physical environments. As he states, "Our early ancestors coveted the circle, perceiving time as eternal return, a ceaseless repetition of an endless cycle of birth, life, death, and rebirth". Since these cyclical rhythms could neither be accelerated, nor altered, the cadence of these societies' was natural and harmonious.
The Magical Relationship between Leaders and the Led
August 5, 2008