Blind Spots In Leadership Assessment
Succession planning is a critical task for any leader. When succession planning comes from internal staff, thorough leadership assessment supports the best choices and is something that I’ve struggled to master. This week’s reading has given me new tools to use when assessing leaders for succession planning.
Leadership: Theory and Practice by Peter Northouse, PhD is an excellent book on leadership that has been translated into 12 languages, used in 89 countries, and adopted by more than 1,000 colleges worldwide. [1] Professors consistently share that they appreciate Northouse’s work, the chronological approach, and the consistent structure for each leadership theory (narrative, strength/weaknesses, application of theory, case studies, and self-assessment). [2] Peter Northouse is Professor Emeritus of Communication in the School of Communication at Western Michigan University and has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in leadership, interpersonal communication, and organizational communication for more than 30 years. [3]
Leadership is structured around the chronological progression of prominent leadership theories, with some examples of older models of leadership being the trait approach, skills approach, and the behavioral approach. Newer models include transformational leadership, authentic leadership, and servant leadership. In general, the older leadership models focused more on the individual leader. In comparison, newer models suggest both ethics and the collaboration between leaders and followers play a vital role in the overall success a group will see.
In reading Leadership, I realized two things related to assessing leadership growth, potential, readiness, and maturity:
- I have been working off of some outdated mental models
- Leadership is like a multi-faceted diamond and looking at only a single facet provides an incomplete assessment
In a previous company I worked for, we followed Topgrading hiring and promotion practices. [4] Topgrading is a method of assessing employee potential through intense competency and skills/background interviews. Topgrading aims to obtain the 10% of achievers in all positions. According to Topgrading, many companies suffer from only 25% hiring success. In other words, one year after an employee (or leader) is hired, if the company would enthusiastically rehire them today, the hire was a success. If, however, the company would not enthusiastically rehire them after one year, then this was considered a hiring failure. In general, Topgrading produced decent results for the company I was working for compared to other companies in the same industry and region. But I am wondering if this was an outdated model, and a model that would not work as well for leaders today. It had a heavy emphasis on competencies of the individual leader (skills approach) but had little emphasis on newer perspectives of leadership theory. With the Topgrading process, I interviewed hundreds of candidates, and I’m now realizing that it had a big influence on how I view leadership (incompletely) today.
Like any model that boils down a very complex topic into a simple, one-dimensional understanding, there is likely to be massive holes in the understanding. Rather than assessing leadership from a single dimension (traits, skills, behaviors, etc.) it seems that the best way to assess leadership is through a variety of perspectives. While newer models of leadership focus more on the relational and ethical components of leadership, that doesn’t mean that leadership traits, skills, and behaviors are irrelevant.
A very practical takeaway for me is that I should use a multi-faceted approach to leadership assessment, especially when doing succession planning.
What practical leadership takeaways did you have this week?
References
[1] Peter Guy Northouse, Leadership: Theory and Practice, 7. ed., internat. student ed (Los Angeles, Calif.: SAGE, 2016).
[2] Peter Northouse Discusses Leadership: Theory and Practice, Fifth Edition, n.d., https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3eWfH0_Cb8.
[3] “Meet Peter G. Northouse,” Sage, n.d., https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/peternorthouseauthor.
[4] https://topgrading.com/implementing-topgrading-methods/
About the Author
Christy
6 responses to “Blind Spots In Leadership Assessment”
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Hi Christy,
I have never heard of the Topgrading method. You mentioned it has worked well for your company, but there are still leadership blind spots. If you had a chance to give input on the Topgrading metrics, especially those that are missing or could be strengthened, what would it look like?
Hi Jennifer, Topgrading seems to be built on older leadership models and could be upgraded to include newer models like servant leadership. A leader may have great competencies and past experience, but if they don’t grasp servant leadership, they will be missing out on the fullness of what God intends for them as a leader.
Hi Christy,
You are so right to say “A very practical takeaway for me is that I should use a multi-faceted approach to leadership assessment, especially when doing succession planning.”. What 4 top leadership styles you relate to?
Hello, Christy, thank you for your post. I like the way you use ‘multi-facet’ diamond in your analogy for ‘leadership.’ Would you say that the styles of leadership could be incorporated into one ‘multi-facet’ leadership style?
Hi Christy,
Thank you for your blog. I believe that you are not alone carrying this older mental model. I believe it’s subtly baked into our culture. One way a preference for trait and skills approach can play out is in terms of gender. Most women do not naturally match the preferred standard in those approaches and are still sometimes labeled ‘weak’ as a result. Your suggestion to view leadership through a multifaceted lens could be beneficial in raising female leaders. People who do so will value other approaches to leadership.
Hi Julie, great observation! Thanks for giving me something to chew on!