Page 136 - The extraordinary leader

Leaders Must Fit Their Organization • 113

Competencies Passions

C P

Leadership
O Sweet Spot

Organizational Needs

Figure 5-1 The COP Model

can also be an area of knowledge or expertise. As you think about yourself and
your abilities, some of these competencies are behaviors that you tend to be
naturally good at, whereas others have been developed over years of steady
growth and practice. They may be skills at casual conversation, writing, under-
standing complex problems, conceptualizing models, listening, giving direc-
tion, or staying calm under pressure. To understand your competencies, you
might ask yourself: When people talk about my strengths, what do they men-
tion first? Where have I been successful in the past? What abilities do I seem
to do better than others?

Organizational Needs
The “O” in the COP model stands for organizational needs. In order for lead-
ers to be successful or for an individual to find the “leadership sweet spot,”
the competencies people have and the passion for what they want to do have
to be valued by the organization. Typically, organizations value competencies
and passions of individuals that have a fairly direct impact on the success of
the organization. Many organizations seem to have a narrow set of compe-
tencies and passions that they value. People can argue about whether the
organization “ought” to value particular competencies when it does not, but
the fact remains that in order for people to find the “leadership sweet spot,”
there needs to be an intersection of competencies, organizational need, and
passion.