Leadership’s Impact and Primary Colours PDFs/Presentations/David... · Leadership’s Impact and...

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Leadership’s Impact and Primary Colours ® Dr David Pendleton June 2012 Associate Fellow Saїd Business School and Green-Templeton College Oxford Chair Edgecumbe Group, Bristol

Transcript of Leadership’s Impact and Primary Colours PDFs/Presentations/David... · Leadership’s Impact and...

Leadership’s Impact and Primary Colours®

Dr David Pendleton June 2012 Associate Fellow Saїd Business School and Green-Templeton College Oxford Chair Edgecumbe Group, Bristol

The Primary Colours® of Leadership

• The evidence base for Leadership

• The Primary Colours ®

model of Leadership

• Leadership tasks

How are UK corporate leaders perceived currently in the financial

crisis?

Outline of my session with you today…

The effect of leadership is INDIRECT

Leadership

Culture (what we do)

Climate (how it feels)

Discretionary Effort

Productivity, Creativity etc.

(Results)

The argument in a nutshell…

Leadership Traits Intelligence Emotional Stability Extraversion Openness to Experience Agreeableness Conscientiousness

DeRue, Nahrgang, Wellman and Humphrey, (2011) Trait and Behavioral Theories of Leadership, Personnel Psychology,

Leadership Behaviours Task oriented Relationship oriented Change oriented (Passive leadership)

Leadership Effectiveness Leader effectiveness (58%)* Group performance (31%)* Follower job satisfaction (56%)* Satisfaction with leader (92%)*

* Proportion of each measure of leadership effectiveness explained by a combination of leadership traits and leadership behaviours

Combining who they are with what they do…

Relationship between Employee Satisfaction, Employee Engagement and Business Outcomes

A meta-analysis of 198,514 employees in 7,939

Business Units, found:

• Employee engagement was directly linked to

profitability, customer satisfaction, loyalty, sales,

employee retention, productivity and safety.

• Employee satisfaction and engagement were mainly

determined by satisfaction with immediate

supervisor

Hunter, Schmidt and Hayes, Journal of Applied Psychology, 2002

Leadership

Culture (what we do) Climate (how it feels) Discretionary

effort

Employee retention

Employee Engagement

Intention to stay

Productivity Whole-person Creativity (Results)

Rational Commitment

Emotional Commitment

…and we can measure and/or estimate the size of the effects. EG moving from disengagement to strong engagement decreases the probability of leaving by 87%

Source: Corporate Leadership Council 2004

The argument in a nutshell moves on ….and on

Estimated impact on discretionary effort (weights)

Source: Corporate Leadership Council 2004

Conclusions from the evidence…

• Leadership makes a difference to performance

• It makes more of a difference in tougher times when opportunities are scarce (like now!)

• The effect is indirect and mediated largely through the effect on people

• The impact is largely to do with the power of engagement and the effect on discretionary effort

• The effect is a mixture of who we are and what we do. We will explore both

What do leaders need to do to bring this about? A new theory of Leadership

• Leadership is creating the conditions for people and organisations to

succeed and achieve significant goals

• Four Propositions

…and Coping with Pressure

Ref: Pendleton and Furnham 2012

Leadership Proposition 1: The Primary Colours® of Leadership

Delivering Results

Planning & Organising

Setting Strategic Direction

Creating Alignment

Building & Sustaining

Relationships Team

Working

Leading

Strategic Domain

Operational Domain

Interpersonal Domain

Think of this as body parts and capabilities

Thought/Figuring out which way to go

Feeling/Emotional Intelligence

Action/Getting things done

So what is LEADING?

The Nervous System

• Sensing

• Connecting

• Balancing

• Co-ordinating

Delivering Results

Planning & Organising

Setting Strategic Direction

Creating Alignment

Building & Sustaining

Relationships Team Working

Leading

Strategic Domain

Operational

Domain

Interpersonal

Domain

Leading

Leadership Proposition 2: Incomplete individuals, complete teams…

• It’s hard to be world class in all areas

• There are sound psychological reasons why this may be so and

empirical evidence to support it

• Rather than trying to be good in all areas, it may be better to be great

in one or two and work with others who are great in other areas

The Heptathlete…

• Javelin

• Shot

• 1500 metres

• 100 metres

• High jump

• Long jump

• Hurdles

Gallup (2008)

“While the best leaders are not well-rounded, the best teams are.”

“Effective leaders surround themselves with the right people and build on each person’s strengths.”

Summarising data from many years and thousands of leaders…

In praise of the incomplete leader…

“Rarely will a single person be skilled in all …. areas. That's why it's critical that leaders find others who can offset their limitations and complement their

strengths. Those who don't will not only bear the burden of leadership alone but will find themselves at the helm of an unbalanced ship.”

Deborah Ancona and colleagues HBR 2007

Don’t try to be a duck…

Walks

Flies

Swims

…..but none very well!

Leadership Proposition 3: Work with, work on and work around…

Resistant limitation Fragile strength PERSONALITY

HINDERS

Potential strength

Natural strength PERSONALITY

HELPS

LIMITATION STRENGTH

Work ON

Work ON Work WITH

Work AROUND

Resistant

Limitations

STRENGTH LIMITATION

PERSONALITY HELPS

PERSONALITY

HINDERS

Fragile

Strengths

Potential

Strengths

Natural

Strengths

Fragile

Strengths

Potential

Strengths

Natural

Strengths

Resistant

Limitations

Leadership Proposition 4: Complementary Contributions

Delivering Results

Planning & Organising

Setting Strategic Direction

Creating Alignment

Building & Sustaining

Relationships Team

Working

Leading

Strategic Domain

Operational

Domain

Interpersonal

Domain

Ref: Pendleton and Furnham 2012

The Primary Colours® of Leadership: the Leadership home page?

Pendleton, D and Furnham, A (2012) Leadership: all you need to know London, Palgrave Macmillan

Key Findings 2012

• positive about future prospects for their organisation 40%

• feel their business is in safe hands 36%

• improving quality of leadership would make a difference to their organisation’s prospects 74%

1: Current Levels of Confidence

45%

• said leaders more task focused

9%

• said leaders more relationship focused

61%

• said leaders more short-term oriented

4%

• said leaders more long-term oriented

2: UK leaders’ response to current economic climate

52%

53%

56%

46%

43%

40%

40%

35%

27%

22%

14%

24%

25%

25%

20%

21%

21%

25%

30%

30%

32%

35%

40%

44%

Set strategic direction

Plan and organise work

Deliver results

Lead

Work in teams

Cope with pressure

Build & sustain relationships

Create alignment between people

%positive %neutral %negativeBase: All (201)

3: UK Leaders’ Strengths & Weaknesses

74% - improving quality of leadership will make a difference to organisation’s prospects

BUT

4% feel improving quality of leadership is a top priority for their organisation

17% confident that their organisation’s current activities to improve leadership

will deliver

4: What are leaders doing about this?

THANKS!