Page 208 - The extraordinary leader

New Insights into Leadership Development • 185

We then asked how many of the companies were doing most of the activ-
ities on the list. Most companies indicated that their managers had been
taught, coached, provided a model, and rewarded; but that their organization
needed more. Based on our research, we found that leaders who were effec-
tive at developing others practiced self-development, whereas those who were
ineffective at developing others had little interest in developing themselves.
We then suggested, based on this research, that one of the best ways to get
managers interested in developing others was to make sure these managers
had a good development plan themselves.
This was confirmed from our experience in a large food company that pro-
vided a training program for managers and individual contributors on how to
create an individual development plan. In evaluating the effectiveness of the
individual development plans, it was found that those managers who were
interested in their own individual development were the ones most likely to
facilitate the creation of effective development plans with their direct reports.
Imagine a manager who feels that she is at a dead end in her career or has
no sense of what she might be doing in the future. What kind of career dis-
cussions would this leader have with her direct reports? She might be trying
hard to say the right words, but inside she would say to herself, “Why should
I give you career advice? If you get promoted, you will be at the same dead
end that I’m in. There is no future in this company.”
A good solution for making an organization more focused on people develop-
ment is to make sure that managers and leaders have a clear career plan and
developmental opportunities in their future. Leaders will act developmentally
if they are being developed.
How Do You Build a Great Team? Our analysis on the competency
companions to teamwork revealed that having trusting relationships is strongly
associated with good teamwork. Most relationships depend on trust as a basis
for the relationship. Teams without trust suffer from conflicts and competi-
tion between team members. Those leaders who were trusted also had the
following characteristics:

1. Consideration for others. A key behavior to leveraging trust is having a
high level of concern for how one’s behavior affects others. Often, lack
of consideration is demonstrated when deadlines or problems occur in
the group. It is easy to be considerate when everything is running
smoothly. Balancing the need to get the job done with sensitivity for
others’ needs and problems demonstrates true consideration.