Vision and ethics at the heart of training
Companies spend huge amounts on moulding future leaders. But much of their effort
ADVERTISEMENT
is missing the point, argues Morgen Witzel Kofi Annan,UN secretary-general, has been cleared of wrongdoing over the oil for food scandal in Iraq, but he remains under pressure. Some now regard Mr Annan as a weak leader who failed to prevent the scandal. He is not the only high-profile leader under pressure at the moment; last week, Phil Purcell, Morgan Stanley's chairman, responded to continuing criticism of his leadership of the bank by firing several top executives.
Is there a wider crisis in business leadership? Two recent studies suggest so. In an article in the latest issue of the Harvard Business Review, David Rooke of Harthill Consulting and William Torbert, professor at the Carroll School of Management in Boston, find that 55 per cent of leaders are associated with below-average corporate performance. Only 15 per cent of the leaders they studied over 25 years showed a consistent ability to manage innovation and organisational change. The UK's Chartered Institute for Professional Development last week published a report suggesting that many companies are suffering from a shortage of effective leadership. Particularly disturbing was the CIPD's conclusion that, though companies are investing large sums of money in leadership training, such training is failing to deliver the skills that leaders need if they are to be effective.
The research suggests that companies need to look again at the way they train and develop leaders. Managers should bear in mind, though, that training cannot work miracles. Professor Peter Case of the Centre for Leadership Studies at the University of Exeter cautions against treating training as a “philosopher's stone” that will automatically produce successful leaders. Leadership requires good raw material to work with, and leaders must have some inherent ability if training and development are to make a difference.
Nonetheless, virtually every successful leader in history has had a tutor or served an apprenticeship that taught them necessary skills. Alexander the Great studied under Aristotle; in modern times, Jack Welch trained as a junior engineer at General Electric before rising to become its leader. Both men's approaches to leadership were shaped by their early experiences. Natural intelligence and ability are essential for leading, but it is just as essential that these qualities be developed and enhanced.
If training and education can turn a potential leader into an actual one and make good leaders better, what is wrong with the current approach to training and development? First, consider what needs to change to make a leader more successful. Rooke and Torbert argue that the factor that determines leadership success is what they call “action logic”, in other words, how a person views the world around them and reacts to challenges and threats. Further, they believe that underperforming leaders can be helped to change their action logic.
Such leaders fall into several categories, including “opportunists” who seek to manipulate others to protect their own position or “diplomats” who try to avoid conflict and please everyone at the same time. Mr Annan is a classic example of a diplomat in this sense. With training, suggest Rooke and Torbert, leaders can move to a different level, becoming, for example, a “strategist” someone with long-term vision who sees barriers to change as a series of challenges to be overcome or an “alchemist”, someone who can reinvent an organisation and draw people to share his or her vision almost effortlessly; the authors cite Nelson Mandela as an example.
Another great alchemist was Pierre du Pont, who in the early twentieth century built up first his family company, Du Pont, and then General Motors to be world-class organisations. Du Pont had a genius for transforming companies, which he achieved mainly by recruiting top-flight management teams who shared his vision and knew how to achieve it.
Henry Heinz, who created one of the world's most enduring brands, may be regarded as a great strategist. Heinz systematically overcame all barriers to growth, at least in part through a sense of personal belief in his company and its mission to provide people with safe, high-quality food. But are leaders getting the training they need to achieve such transformation? Richard Bolden, research fellow at the Centre for Leadership Studies at Exeter University, believes not. In a recent research paper, Mr Bolden criticises one of the most common approaches to leadership development and assessment: leadership competency frameworks.
These are lists of defined skills and abilities that each company believes it requires from its leaders, such as the ability to think strategically, communications skills, analytical skills, the ability to manage change and so on. Leaders and potential leaders are measured against these frameworks, and analysis of the resulting gap shows where skills and training are required.
Most competency frameworks currently in use, says Mr Bolden, concentrate on such skills. The problem, he adds, is that personal skills and abilities are necessary, but not sufficient, for leadership. While most competency frameworks focus inward, on the leader, leaders themselves are usually looking outward, trying to make sense of the world and their place in it. His study shows that the leadership issues of greatest concern to leaders themselves vision, trust, personal belief, ethics, moral courage are not included in most competency frameworks. The emotional, ethical and cultural aspects of leadership, he says, are being sidelined or ignored.
The social aspects of leadership have long been known. In Leadership in a Free Society, published in 1936, Thomas North Whitehead, a Harvard academic, observed that leaders are social beings with attitudes and actions strongly shaped by those they lead; leadership is not a case of those who give orders and those who follow them, but is an interaction between leaders and subordinates.
Others have reinforced the importance of wider aspects of leadership. Warren Bennis, a noted writer on leadership and professor at the Marshall School of Business, has argued that the key dimensions of leadership include factors such as vision, meaning, trust and self-knowledge. These are not skills that can be taught by rote; they are personal qualities that must be nurtured and developed.
What happens when leaders lack these qualities? Len Sayles, professor emeritus of management at Columbia University, argues that many corporate scandals of recent years came about at least in part because leaders began to believe in their own mythical status.
Like the “masters of the universe” satirised by Tom Wolfe in The Bonfire of the Vanities, top managers sought personal glory and reward over the interests of their business, and chased short-term financial performance instead of long-term sustainability. Kenneth Lay of Enron and Bernie Ebbers of WorldCom would have scored highly on most measures of personal leadership skills, but vision and trust were replaced by the ability to finesse the numbers and look good on television. We all know the result.
So, how can companies get the leaders they need? Training in communications skills, empathy and analytical ability is certainly necessary. Yet much more is needed. Leadership training programmes that assume human and social qualities are already present in the leader that all that is required is the development of skills are doomed to fail. Mr Bolden's research suggests that it is precisely in the area of personal, ethical and emotional development that leaders themselves are calling for help. A shift in leadership training away from generic skills and towards personal development may be the only answer.
商业领袖要有情商
联合国秘书长科菲?安南(Kofi Annan)已经摆脱了伊拉克石油换食品丑闻中不当行为的牵连，但他目前仍承受着压力。由于安南未能阻止丑闻的发生，现在有一些人将其视作软弱的领导人。眼下，安南并不是唯一承受压力的高层领导人；上周，摩根士丹利(Morgan Stanley)董事长裴熙亮(Phil Purcell)解雇了几名高管人员，以此回应对他的领导能力的批评。
企业领导能力是否存在更广泛的危机？最近进行的两项研究结果显示确实如此。在最新一期《哈佛商业评论》(Harvard Business Review)的一篇文章中，Harthill Consulting公司的大卫?鲁克(David Rooke)和波士顿卡罗尔管理学院(Carroll School of Management)教授威廉?托伯特(William Torbert)发现，55%的公司领导人与公司业绩低于平均水平有关。在他们超过25年的研究过程中，只有15%的企业领导人显示出持之以恒的管理创新及组织变革的能力。上周，英国“皇家职业发展学院(CIPD)”发布了一份报告，指出目前许多公司都缺乏有效的领导人。尤其令人担忧的是该学院的报告结论：尽管企业在领导能力培训方面投入巨资，但这种培训方式未能向领导人传授有效管理所需的技能。
此项研究指出，企业应该重新审视他们培训和培养领导人员的方式。不过，管理者应该牢记培训无法创造奇迹。埃克塞特大学(University of Exeter)“领导力研究中心”(Centre for Leadership Studies)教授彼得?凯斯(Peter Case)警告说，不要把这种培训看作是可以自动创造成功领导人的“点金石”。领导能力的培养需要首先拥有优质的原材料来加工，如果希望通过培训和发展带来变化，领导人自身必须具备一些天赋。
话说回来，历史上几乎所有成功的领导人都曾有一位导师，或以学徒身份学习过一段时间的必要技能。亚历山大大帝(Alexander the Great)曾师从亚里士多德；在现代，杰克?韦尔奇(Jack Welch)在晋升为通用电气(GE)领导人之前，曾接受过初级工程师培训。两人在领导方式上都受到早期经历的影响。天生的智慧和能力是成为领导人的关键，但是，开发和强化这些素质同样至关重要。
行动逻辑
如果培训和教育能够将一位具有领导潜质的人造就成真正的领导者，并且使优秀的领导人变得更加优秀，那么现有的培训和培养方式存在哪些不妥之处呢？首先，我们要考虑，提高一位领导人的领导能力需要做出哪些变革。卢克和托伯特认为，领导力成功与否的决定性因素，在于他们所称的“行动逻辑”，即一个人如何看待周围的世界，以及如何应对挑战和威胁。此外，他们还认为，表现不佳的领导人可以通过外界帮助，改变他们的行为逻辑。
这些领导人分为以下几类，包括寻求通过操纵别人以保全自身职位的“机会主义者”，以及努力避免冲突、力图使所有人都满意的“外交官型领导人”。从这个意义上讲，安南先生堪称外交官型领导人的典范。卢克和托伯特表示，可以通过培训将领导人提升到另外一个水平，比如，成为“战略家”：能够着眼于未来，将变革过程中的种种阻碍视作一系列有待克服的挑战；或成为“炼金术士”：能够重构组织，并在几乎毫不费力的情况下号召人们分享他的远见；作者引用纳尔逊?曼德拉(Nelson Mandela)作为“炼金术士”式领导人的实例。
另一位伟大的“炼金术”式领导者是皮埃尔?杜邦(Pierre du Pont)，他在20世纪初成立了自己的第一个家族企业“杜邦”，然后成立通用汽车(General Motors)，并使两家公司都成为世界一流企业。杜邦在公司转型方面具有天才能力，这主要是通过聘用精英管理团队来实现。这些精英管理团队与其目标一致，也知道如何实现其目标。
作为世界最悠久品牌之一的缔造者，亨利?海因茨(Henry Heinz)可被视为一位伟大的战略家。海因茨之所以能够系统克服增长过程中的所有障碍，至少部分是因为他拥有一种个人信念。他相信自己的公司，并恪守公司使命：向人们提供安全和高质量的食品。
领导能力框架
然而，如今的领导人是否有机会获得实现这种转变所需的培训呢？埃克塞特大学“领导力研究中心”研究员理查德?伯尔顿(Richard Bolden)认为没有。在近期的一份研究论文中，博尔顿先生对最常见的领导力开发和评估方式提出了批评：领导能力框架标准。
这些是一系列明确界定的技能及能力的清单，这些技能及能力是各个公司认为作为领导人员需要具备的，如战略思考能力、沟通技能、分析能力、管理变革的能力等。公司会依据此框架标准评估领导者和潜在领导者，然后对识别的差距加以分析，找出哪些方面需要相应的技能和培训。
伯尔顿表示，多数公司目前采用的框架标准都集中在这些技能上。他补充说，问题是，就领导能力而言，个人技能和能力虽然必不可少，但还不够充分。当多数领导能力框架标准着重于公司内部，以领导者为焦点时，领导者自身却通常正着眼于公司外部，试图领悟整个世界以及他们在世界中所处的位置。伯尔顿的研究结果显示，领导者最值得关注的领导力问题，如远见、信任、个人信念、道德水准、道义勇气等，却未被包含在多数领导能力框架内。他说，领导力在情感、道德和文化层面的涵义，正被边缘化，甚至被人们所忽视。
领导力在社会层面的意义早已为人所知。哈佛大学学者托马斯?诺斯?怀特黑德(Thomas North Whitehead)在1936年出版的《自由社会的领导力》(Leadership in a Free Society)一书中评论说，领导者是社会个体，他们的观念和行动在很大程度上受被领导者的影响；领导行为并非是有人发号施令，其他人遵照执行，而是领导和下属之间的一种互动。
其他人则强调了领导力在更广泛层面上的重要性。著名领导力专著作家、马歇尔商学院(Marshall School of Business) 教授沃伦?班尼斯(Warren Bennis)认为，领导力的主要层面包括远见、内涵、信任和自我认知等要素。这些不是生搬硬套就可以学会的技能，而是需要培养和开发的个人素质。
领导者缺乏这些素质将会怎样？哥伦比亚大学管理学名誉教授雷恩?萨里斯(Len Sayles)认为，近年来之所以频繁发生公司丑闻，至少部分原因是由于领导者开始迷信自己的神圣地位。
正如汤姆?伍夫(Tom Wolfe)在《虚荣的篝火》(The Bonfire of the Vanities)中所讽刺的“宇宙之主”那样，高层管理人员把追求个人荣耀和回报凌驾于企业利益之上，追求短期财务业绩，而非企业的长期可持续发展。安然公司(Enron)前任董事长肯尼斯?莱(Kenneth Lay)和世通公司(WorldCom)前任首席执行官伯尼?埃伯斯(Bernie Ebbers)的确会在多数个人领导力技能考核项目中获得高分，但在远见和信任这两个层面，他们却无法及格，因为他们只注重虚构数字和在镜头前的形象。由之而产生的结局都已为我们所熟知。
如此看来，企业应如何获得其所需的领导者？培养沟通技能、善解人意以及分析能力固然重要。然而，这些还远远不够。如果领导力培训项目从开始即认定领导人已经具备人性和社会素质，所需要做的仅仅是开发领导人技能，那么这样的培训项目注定会失败。
伯尔顿先生的研究结果显示，目前领导人正是在个人、道德和情感等方面的发展问题上需要获得帮助。将领导力培训项目的重心从培养通用技能转向培养个人素质，可能是解决这一问题的唯一答案。
