Succession Planning, Make Communication Job #1 for Emerging Leaders<br>An Excerpt from Suzanne Bates upcoming book: Motivate Like a CEO
Every leader in the organization needs to have responsibility for communicating, motivating and aligning the workforce. In today's business world, good communication skills are no longer nice to have, they are a must. If people aren't up to the task, they can't help you. Bill Lane, Jack Welch's speechwriter at GE for 20 years, wrote in his memoir Jacked Up, "Every single one of the (people) who were in the original field of 23 potential GE CEOs is a good-to-great "presenter." Some have some weaknesses, usually related to PowerPoint, but none could ever be described as "deadly." You simply cannot get a job at this level if you can't stand up and teach, and persuade, excite…and lead."
You need a team of people working as hard as you do to motivate and align the organization. Emerging leaders need to have not only technical and analytical skill but also ability to communicate and inspire others. As they move up through the organization, greater emphasis should be placed on their ability to articulate purpose and drive the values down through the organization.
Many people don't see communication as their strength, which means they fall back to doing more of what they already know how to do. They may not feel it's important or even worth it to push to do this. If they've gone pretty far in their careers without this skill, you may find them resistant when you suggest they hire a coach or go to training. They may be thinking, "you didn't hire me to be a speaker, you hired me to be a business leader."
The secret to helping leaders improve is to push them out there to do it. If they feel a little uncomfortable at first, that's a good thing. It will encourage them to raise the level of their game. Jeff Taylor says, "I have this expression if you are nervous, you are in danger of learning something. And if you're not nervous, you didn't do a big enough presentation. I lean into the adrenaline rush as opposed to leaning back."
I will never forget a conversation with a first-time CEO, who had been on the job about a year. He is a great guy, down to earth and unassuming, the type who trusts people to do what they need to do. The trouble was that his CFO and COO were terrible presenters, unable to communicate the new business strategy to their key audiences. They didn't "have time" for coaching and never practiced their presentations. The CEO was reluctant to push; when he did, they pushed back so he dropped it.
However, a major meeting was scheduled and they weren't ready, the CEO was concerned. We sketched out the org chart and looked at the skills of each senior team member. What struck us both was that he had this bottleneck; he was the only one really focused on articulating the message. We drew another sketch of what it would look like if every leader were engaged in communicating the vision and strategy. "I get it," he said, "I have to insist they learn how to do this."
Make it absolutely clear that you consider this part of every leader's job. You aren't doing people any favors by giving them a pass on this. Not everyone is going to be great but they will get better. If you don't deal with resistance you only delay the inevitable.
We worked with one CEO who had a guy named "George" on his team who was technically brilliant but a poor communicator. He hated it so much he even avoided calling team meetings. When he did set them up he often canceled them or had other people take the speaking roles. He preferred being on the road with clients. The CEO still believed in this individual because he depended upon him for technical advice.
Eventually, painful as it was, the CEO had to move George into an individual contributor role. It was the right thing to do. George was happier and the CEO was able to put in a leader who was effective in communicating with the team, which had an immediate, positive impact on productivity and morale. The lesson is, if you have a leader who simply isn't going to do it, you need to make the hard call. Technical and analytical s kills are important but without the ability to communicate, the leader will be ineffective.
Some people are quick studies and embrace the process. Others are not as enthusiastic. Sometimes it's because they don't understand how important this skill is to their success. But often it's because they don't understand what kind of investment they need to make to really become proficient.
Motivate Like a CEO, Communicate Your Strategic Vision and Inspire People to Act! will be published by McGraw Hill in January 2009. You can order copies in advance by going to www.amazon.com or www.barnesandnoble.com