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When a manager engages a new-start he or she will inevitably have expectations. Many of these are likely to be legitimate…
More than perhaps at any other time, a leader’s sincerity is put to the test …
A leading business expert is warning that male narcissists perform well in job interviews but make disastrous leaders …
Question of the Month
By Ian Munro, director, Legitimate Leadership.
Question: How do you implement care and growth if the company’s existing reward system is tightly coupled to results?
Answer: The Legitimate Leadership Model says people should be held accountable for their contribution. Not how hard they tried or how much effort they put in, and not whether the result was achieved or not, but their actual contribution against an agreed standard.
The leader then needs to determine whether the contribution made was on, above, or below the standard; understand why this was the case; and then reward, recognize, censure or discipline appropriately …Read the full answer by clicking here
VIGNETTE CASE STUDY: CLARIFYING EXPECTATIONS AND WATCHING THE GAME – THE ANTIDOTE FOR DANGEROUS ASSUMPTIONS
By Peter Jordan, associate, Legitimate Leadership.
When a manager engages a new-start he or she will inevitably have expectations. Many of these are likely to be legitimate, based on the new recruit’s prior experience, qualifications and other aspects, as explored in the recruitment process.
No recruitment process is however a substitute for a systematic and thorough “watching of the game” during the probation period. This diagnostic will bring to the fore any gaps in ability which may have been undetected during the recruitment process. Perhaps of greater importance, watching the new start’s game will reveal levels of energy and engagement (summarised as “willingness issues”) which are much more difficult to assess via recruitment instruments.
Similarly, the new employee will also have expectations related to his or her new position. The sooner these are made explicit via one-on-one meetings the better.
READ THE FULL CASE STUDY BY CLICKING HERE
ARTICLE: WHAT ‘CARE’ REQUIRES OF LEADERS WHEN THEIR PEOPLE HAVE PERSONAL PROBLEMS
By Wendy Lambourne, director, Legitimate Leadership.
More than perhaps at any other time, a leader’s sincerity is put to the test when her people have problems of a personal nature. When a genuine personal problem arises – the death of a loved one, a divorce, a serious illness – do leaders notice and do they care?
What a leader should and should not do in these situations is a matter of debate. Should she approach an employee who has a personal problem but doesn’t want to talk about it? When is the best time to broach an issue? How should a sensitive issue be tackled? Is it ever appropriate to speak to someone else about the employee’s problem, especially if he has asked the leader not to?
To none of these questions is there a clear answer. The really critical question in fact relates not so much to the “when”, “where” and “how” of the problem but to the “why”.
ARTICLE: DON’T HIRE THE CONFIDENT ONE – HE’LL BECOME A BULLYING MANAGER
By Rosamund Urwin, British journalist.
COMMENT BY WENDY LAMBOURNE, LEGITIMATE LEADERSHIP: Rosamund Urwin’s article is deliberately provocative and stimulates some useful reflection on leadership.
Legitimate Leadership does not agree with everything that is stated as ‘fact’ in the article. The view that 60–70% of bosses are ‘bad’ is too pessimistic. Our experience suggests a less bleak outlook and that most people in authority can learn, with concerted practice, to lead effectively.
We also do not agree with the cut-and-dried gender bias. Our experience is that there are both men and woman who are good ‘care and growth’ leaders – and the converse.
But we absolutely agree that ‘leadership should be about managing down: turning a bunch of people into a high-performing team’. We also concur that not only appointment but also promotion decisions should be made with consideration of the individual’s leadership behaviour and practice as experienced by those who are on the receiving end of those behaviours and practices – namely, direct reports.
We also agree that ego–driven people in leadership roles are a problem. This is because the job of the leader is too make others, not themselves, big.
There are however other personal attributes which, if they are features of the leader, can undermine their capacity to lead. These are outlined in the article ‘Can anyone Lead?’ by Wendy Lambourne. In addition to being ego–driven those in authority will also not be effective leaders if they are virtuosos or cannot let go of their preference for the technical stuff; are overly-affiliative; can’t let go and trust others or are micro managers; are trapped in victim mode; and lack compassion/empathy.
OUR SUMMARY OF THIS ARTICLE: A leading business expert is warning that male narcissists perform well in job interviews but make disastrous leaders.
Job interviews should be scraped to prevent narcissists — who will go on to mistreat their staff — from being hired as managers, according to the author of a new book by Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic.
Chamorro-Premuzic a professor of business psychology, believes that interviews encourage bosses to hire in their own image, rather than on merit.
“They invite us to perpetuate our biases,” he said. “What you need is data-driven assessment: CVs, psychological tests and analysis of past performance.”
He believes that the most self-aggrandising applicants perform better in interviews than their more humble and more understated peers.