A Changing Role for Leadership
Management must be the champion of the change
process. A change
revolution is needed to pave the way for a new entrepreneurial
spirit to be breathed into the organization. Without management
instigation and daily involvement in the change process, the
results will be lukewarm at best.
Management must relay its vision to all segments of the
organization, help ensure that goals and objectives are clearly
defined in terms understood by every employee, then ensure
charters are developed and executed. Management must be the torch
bearer, cheerleader and barrier to success remover if this change
process is to occur within a reasonable time period.
Change must be inspired and leadership focused.
Implementing change involves a financial investment, therefore
determining the cost of this cultural change is essential to
prudent management.
Management must provide an environment
conducive to empowerment, and, then, they must become
cheerleaders, motivators and barrier to success removers so as to
support the empowering process.
A significant empowerment issue is conveying to
the empowered employees that management leadership is truly
committed to passing along the authority. This barrier will take
more than words to overcome. In practice, this can only be
overcome by management living the example, being a
fire-breathing advocate of the process and cheering on the
successes in a very visible fashion. Cheerleading, in this regard,
is more that just accolades. Cheer-leading is a day-to-day
commitment to seek and destroy all barriers to the success of the
process, to the extent that, a significant part of top
management's job becomes championing this transition process. The
premise also assumes that all members of the executive staff
participate in the championing process. This cannot be delegated
to one executive only, unless that one executive is the chief
executive, in which case, by definition, it is practiced by the
CEO's subordinates.
To lead the transition properly, the following
Critical Success Factors are needed to help ensure proper priority
is maintained:
• Expressing a sincere desire to change
• Defining specific measurable goals and objectives
• Developing a time-phased action plan
• Continually expressing confidence in the
ability of the organization to change and do it quickly
• Demonstrating absolute determination that
displays to the organization that change is imminent
• Top management functioning as the daily
example reinforcing that the change has been breathed into their
practices and consequently will be fulfilled throughout the
organization.
Rising to the Challenge
With time as the currency for the 2000s, every
passing moment impacts our ability to become formidable champions
in the World Class competitive arena. An essential resource,
people, is still being touted as the critical ingredient for
successful companies. Yet the transformation process agents such
as empowerment, channeling intellectual energy and overcoming the
mundane is creeping along at a snail's pace in most companies.
Consequently, companies are not exploiting the many talents that
people can bring to the table. Individuals are still servants of
the information processing function rather than using information
to assist them in decision support (what percentage of time is the
corporate employee body spending in data manipulation, leafing
through paper reports and conducting information due diligence
research projects versus decision making and execution?).
The challenge for those companies who are
serious about exploiting the full spectrum of employee talent
base relies upon an inherent change in the culture of the company
structure. In addition to transforming performance measurements
from the hierarchical to process orientation, the identification
of every
individual's contribution competency must be
defined. The mundane tasks people are performing, which could be
much faster performed by computers, will be an essential
ingredient to create the time needed to conduct the necessary
skills inventory and deploy individual talents currently
unexploited into their areas of interest and strength.
We continue to recruit without identifying if,
per chance, the skill needed already exists within our existing
unexploited talent base. Our recruiting activity is still
technical and skill focused rather than team player focused,
causing continual disruptions to the value of existing talent
base. We can never recover from wasted and/or passed time that has
not taken advantage of every employee talent asset. The companies
who are postured to exploit the full complement of skills for the
entire employee population will surface as the performance leaders
as the 21st Century continues. Our window of opportunity narrows
with each passing day.
Conclusion
A visionary company's quest for the remainder
of the 1990s should demonstrate . . .
• A passion for Quality
• Responsiveness to the customer (customer centered vision)
• Agility and Flexibility
• Continuous improvement driven
• Fast Cycle adeptness
• Ability to change, and do it quickly
The management leadership may be challenged and
the company's viability placed at risk if change does not occur
quickly. Thriving on change will require the management team to
demonstrate unparalleled mastery of ...
• Leadership
• Information tools
• Productivity improvements
• Process performance measurements
• Agility and Flexibility
• Customer centered responsiveness
We are at a critical juncture to inspire the radical changes
needed that will allow the United States to surface as a world
leader in manufacturing again. The key to the future is how we
handle the change in light of a faster, better, cheaper theme.
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