PERSPECTIVES

BURNING PLATFORM

Imagine a disaster scenario: an oil-platform in flames in the middle of the North Sea in mid-winter. All employees are fearfully looking over the railing confronted with the choice between being burnt to death or to jump in to the sea. No time left for a long decision making processes, as the flames are closing in. This is the concept of the “Burning Platform”, which is used to benefit from fear and uncertainty along with the evident need for change and strong leadership. This is the moment where existing strong leaders prove their value and where weaker or developing leaders can take advantage and step up.

The more urgent and threatening the situation, the better it is. Sometimes these Burning Platform situations are intentionally created, sometimes they present themselves ‘as a gift from God’, and sometimes the Platform has already been burning for some time without being noticed.

Once discovered the Platform generates enormous amounts of energy, that only needs to be channeled correctly (away from fear towards motivation) to provide an unbelievable leadership boost. The principle of the Burning Platform is not only applicable in global situations or for politicians; it can also be rolled out into SME’s. You will notice that establishing or improving leadership becomes much easier and effective once you have discovered the flames and created an awareness of the severity of the situation.

Imagine a disaster scenario: an oil-platform in flames in the middle of the North Sea in mid-winter. All employees are fearfully looking over the railing confronted with the choice between being burnt to death or to jump in to the sea. No time left for a long decision making processes, as the flames are closing in. The common theme is the concept of the “Burning Platform”, which is used to benefit from fear and uncertainty along with the evident need for change and strong leadership. This is the moment where existing leaders prove their value and where weaker or developing leaders can take advantage.

The more urgent and threatening the situation, the better.. Sometimes these Burning Platform situations are intentionally created, sometimes they present themselves ‘as a gift from God’, and sometimes the Platform has already been burning for some time without being noticed.

Once discovered the Platform generates enormous amounts of energy, that only needs to be channeled correctly (away from fear towards motivation) to provide an unbelievable leadership boost. The principle of the Burning Platform is not only applicable in global situations or for politicians; it can also be rolled out into SME’s. You will notice that establishing or improving leadership becomes much easier and effective once you have discovered the flames and created an awareness of the severity of the situation.

THE GLASS CEILING

Most global businesses foster ‘cultural and gender diversity’ as one of their key corporate values. As proof, they will often quote the number of nationalities working in their HQ, and in their CSR reports they will show pictures of managers from various ethnic backgrounds happily and cohesively working together. Diversity is an accelerator for upward career-growth, but only up to a certain level. It is at this level where the brilliant Vietnamese future top-leader suddenly feels increased resistance in his/her quest for a regional or global position in a Western firm. Although, ‘improving our cultural and gender diversity’ is repetitively underlined as a key corporate objective, his/her promotion does not come through.

Why does this occur?

Simply fear of change. We like to be surrounded by people who think the way we do, talk and behave in the same way, enjoy similar food and drinks, games, sports, share the same business principles and have similar leadership styles. Inevitably, the explanation why a promotion didn’t happen often doesn’t reflect any of these reasons. This fear of change and cultural bias evidently leads to employee de-motivation and a significant loss of talent; the Glass Ceiling.

If there is a true desire to remove the Glass Ceiling and to allow for cross-cultural and gender diversity, the solution has to be twofold:

1. Top-down: Management has to show true commitment, by cross-cultural nominations in the c-suite and by setting serious objectives.

2. Bottom-up: In order for the boardroom to truly address the issue of diversity in leadership, employees from across the business need to understand that this problem is ever-present in their organization. The employees should work on their leadership style, political awareness and cross-cultural behavioral pitfalls, often through the help of executive coaching.

MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT FEEDBACK

In the majority of large organisations, the Talent Review & Development cycle is repeated on an annual basis. Leadership teams discuss the functional and organizational leadership pipelines, with managers and high-potentials being evaluated against their goals and their previous year’s performance, whilst also establishing long-term potential and future career plans. Not all bosses have the same opinions about certain individuals, which result in valuable discussions amongst senior management regarding their strengths and weaknesses – this information should be used as rich feedback to the individual to develop or correct their behavior and performance.

Unfortunately this feedback is rarely leveraged, and one year later, senior management will run through the same exercise without capturing or sharing any of the feedback gathered during the session. However good these Talent Review & Development cycle systems are; a chain is as weak as its weakest link. In this case the weak links are:

1. The quality of the management development feedback, as the direct boss (the messenger) is not trained to give concrete feedback – it makes him uncomfortable.

2. The leadership development coaching that should be provided to these high-potentials in order to help them to improve. This may involve developing behavioural alternatives to demonstrate to their bosses that they have acted on feedback. For example: what they should do to improve their presentation skills and what shouldn’t do to become less shy without being stubborn.

A Leadership Development Coach is able to navigate smoothly through the Talent Review & Development process by collecting feedback, presenting it in an actionable format, proposing alternative behaviours and helping with implementation.

This should provide immediate visible results, which can be addressed throughout the next Review process. Subsequently, the Talent Review & Development cycle should be working: reversing the loss of talent and developing a strong and confident leadership pipeline.

In the majority of large organisations, the Talent Review & Development cycle is repeated on an annual basis. Leadership teams discuss the functional and organizational leadership pipelines, with manager and high-potential being evaluated against their goals and their previous year’s performance, whilst also establishing long-term potential and future career plans. Not all bosses have the same opinions about certain individuals, which result in valuable discussions amongst senior management regarding their strengths and weaknesses – this information should be used as rich feedback to the individual to develop or correct their behavior and performance.

Unfortunately this feedback is rarely leveraged, and one year later, senior management will run through the same exercise without capturing or sharing any of the feedback gathered during the session. However good these Talent Review & Development cycle systems are; a chain is as weak as its weakest link. In this case the weak links are:

1. The quality of the management development feedback, as the direct boss (the messenger) is not trained to give concrete feedback – it makes him uncomfortable.

2. The leadership development coaching that should be provided to these high-potentials in order to help them to improve. This may involve developing behavioural alternatives to demonstrate to their bosses that they have acted on feedback. For example: what they should do to improve their presentation skills and what shouldn’t do to become less shy without being stubborn.

A Leadership Development Coach is able to navigate smoothly through the Talent Review & Development process by collecting feedback, presenting it in an actionable format, proposing alternative behaviours and helping with implementation.

This should provide immediate visible results, which can be addressed throughout the next Review process. Subsequently, the Talent Review & Development cycle should be working: reversing the loss of talent and developing a strong and confident leadership pipeline.

LEADING FROM THE FRONT OR FROM BEHIND

Frequently the question is asked: What should the ideal leader be like? How should he/she behave? What should he/she do? Often the reply is categorized by the following axes: directive versus submissive and warm versus cold. Nine times out of ten, the ideal leader is both directive and warm… In the “West”.

PHC-graphThis is not the case in Asia where being explicitly directive is a sign of weakness and getting angry or annoyed brings loss of face. Therefore, local organisations are often run by leaders who never raise their voice, are relatively silent during meetings, and will never go through a door first. Nevertheless, these organisations can run like clockwork.

It’s not easy for a European expat leader to be successful in a leadership role in Asia where the corporate environment goes against his dominant, directive and warm leadership style. This person will have to seriously adapt his/her leadership style; or use alternative strategies, such as leaning on local existing leadership.

The flipside can be more problematic: imagine a submissive-warm executive leading a multinational in a London HQ. The business would quickly go mad due to his apparent indecisiveness or lack of direction.

The Moral: A successful international assignment needs more guidance and training than a “Cross-Cultural Pitfalls” workshop. Prior to departure:

  • The leader needs to be selected carefully. Not only on language skills but also on adaptability in leadership style.
  • The leader needs time to get accustomed to the new situation before fully exposing/engaging him/herself.
  • The leader requires (and often strongly benefits from) Executive Coaching.
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