Accelerating Leadership Development

The cold, harsh reality of business today is that there are too few leaders across all functions of an organization. While good corporate governance can raise the flag, the organization itself is at risk by not having strategies and initiatives at hand to develop its high-potential employees. The greatest challenge facing any organization lies in identifying, developing and retaining great leaders. In addition, the stakes have been raised by the pending demographic tsunami in the form of aging boomers and the different drivers and demands of the generations coming after them. What leaders, aspiring leaders and HR professionals require is a straightforward, practical and useable guide about how to ensure that the leadership talent pipeline is filled and maintained. Accelerating Leadership Development provides a model to assist companies to develop high-potential employees to assume critical roles and develop competencies, intellectual and knowledge capital. It also presents practical and rigorous tools and practices that enable organizations to identify high-potential employees and presents the six factors that can predict the success of future leaders. Once identified, the organization needs to prepare them to lead by developing their strengths and addressing their development needs. Development solutions are presented as well as follow-up procedures to ensure activities are executed and results are achieved. The measures of success are a steady source of ready leaders, engagement and retention of high-potential people, and the development of intellectual capital. But processes and engaged HR professionals are only part of the solution. What of the high-potential people themselves? Leadership is an opportunity and a challenge. Accelerating Leadership Development offers a unique set of strategies and initiatives to enable leaders to build capacity and confidence in their ability to perform. Within a results-oriented framework, the book addresses communication and delegation strategies; useful feedback models; how to shift responsibility and accountability to direct reports; contemporary coaching and development approaches; the role of performance management; and onboarding as an essential business practice. The ideas and concepts in Accelerating Leadership Development are built on research and client experience, and the many examples illustrate the essential connections between business strategy and leadership development.