Building a Better Brand
by John Harrison
Cited by Business Week as the world’s top “guru” in human resource management, David Ulrich has examined how organizations build long-term value through their intangible assets such as leadership, corporate culture and the ability to attract talent. Recently, Dr. Ulrich met with CGE to discuss what he terms a “crisis of leadership” and how organizations need to build a leadership “brand.”
DR. ULRICH, LEADERSHIP IS OF HUGE CONCERN TO PUBLIC SECTOR EMPLOYEES. MANY OF THEM EXPRESS RESERVATIONS ABOUT THE QUALITY OF LEADERSHIP IN THEIR DEPARTMENTS AND AGENCIES, PARTICULARLY THE SENIOR LEADERSHIP. IN YOUR EXPERIENCE, IS THIS PHENOMENON UNIQUE TO THE PUBLIC SECTOR OR IS THIS THINKING JUST AS PREVALENT IN THE PRIVATE SECTOR ORGANIZATIONS THAT YOU HAVE EXAMINED?
I think what we are witnessing is a crisis of leadership in all types of organizations, not just those in the public sector. People are looking to leaders to help them be successful, while the pressures for organizations to be successful are more prevalent than ever before, particularly with increased competition, information, and public scrutiny of organizations. Even organizations like Air Canada with a historically successful brand and franchise are having trouble. Organizations must find ways to succeed – leaders become the lynch pin for that success.
IS THE LEADERSHIP CRISIS THAT YOU TALK ABOUT A RECENT PHENOMENON OR HAS THIS LEVEL OF EXPECTATIONS FOR BETTER LEADERSHIP ALWAYS BEEN THERE?
The pressure for good leadership has always been there, but the intensity of that pressure is greater than it ever has been in our history given information access through the Internet and media, rapid technology changes and constant demographic changes.
SO, HOW SHOULD WE IMPROVE LEADERSHIP IN ORGANIZATIONS?
I believe we need to start with the concept of leadership as a brand. Successful firms like Nike, Coke and General Electric often start with a product brand that becomes a firm brand. A firm’s brand is the firm’s identity in the marketplace, not just the product. When I wear Nike clothes, they hope I send a signal to those who see me. Leaders become the embodiment of the firm brand and should also have a unique identity in their firm. We think about the leadership brand as follows: leadership brand equals attributes times results. When we’re thinking about attributes, we’re thinking of three words: be, know, do; in other words, who you are, what you know and what you do. Attributes are the personal, character and behaviour side of leadership.
Every leader possesses and demonstrates attributes that distinguish him or her as a leader. When we’re assessing a leader’s attributes, we’re looking for four things: The first is whether that person has a vision, or a sense of future, for the organization; the second is whether they can communicate that vision and engage others in the vision; the third is, are they able to build the organizational processes that are necessary to “institutionalize” that vision? For example, how well do they allocate resources, manage people and flow information. Finally, do they have the personal credibility based upon their character, values, integrity, ethics, etc, to command support within and outside of the organization? There are also four domains to the results side of the equation: First, is the individual capable of delivering the committed and engaged employees necessary to achieve success? Next, are they able to deliver the organizational capabilities to succeed? Third, are they ensuring that their clients are being well served – are their clients getting what they need. Last, are the stakeholders (in the case of the public sector, Parliamentarians and the public) getting a return on their investment?
These two things – attributes and results – when combined, give us what we call the “leadership brand”, something that creates the goodwill, identity or image that characterizes the nature of a particular leader. This leadership brand should be a reflection of the firm brand. Coke leaders should be different from Nike leaders who should be different from GE leaders. Each firm has a leadership brand that creates and sustains a firm brand. For example, an individual may have certain attributes of leadership, such as strong integrity and character that command great respect, but they’re not able to deliver on results, so they’re not a good leader and over time the “brand” will suffer, resulting in an eventual crisis of leadership. High attributes and low results will not build a sustained brand. On the other hand, high results (a leader who delivers results) and low attributes (a leader who mistreats people) will not be sustainable either.
SO HOW DOES ONE BUILD THAT LEADERSHIP BRAND THAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT?
There are five basic steps that one needs to take based on our experience. They’re pretty simple steps but they seem to work. One, you need to be clear about the strategy. So you need to be able to articulate a vision and link it to the department or agency’s goals and mandate. Two, you must develop a culture or mindset within the organization that will support the execution of that strategy. Three, you have to be able to identify the specific behaviours that you must work on to be a leader of that organization. Four, you have to be able to understand the results that you need to produce to effectively lead that organization. Five, you need to link steps three and four, the attributes from step three to the results from the fourth step.
HOW DOES SOMEONE KNOW WHETHER OR NOT THEY’RE BEING A GOOD LEADER?
There are two sources of performance data for that. The first, of course, is externally directed. You can ask your employees, your peers or your supervisor. Others will often tell you by word and by reaction how you are doing as a leader. The second source is, I would argue, by far the most important: that is the your internal compass. Remember when we talked about attributes and results? You need to be able to ask yourself two basic questions: Do I have a set of values and principles that will cause me to be respected and credible? And, do I feel as though I’m doing what I need to do to create value for my department or agency? Many leaders lack that internal compass and rely too much on others to define their success. Being grounded and confident in what you are about as a leader becomes critical to success.
HOW DOES SOMEONE BECOME A GOOD LEADER, OR A BETTER LEADER?
I’ve found that it is useful to ask the following questions – good questions often precede good answers. Knowing what questions to ask yourself and others helps one reflect on leadership and what it is about. One, what is it you want to accomplish? Two, what are the options or choices that you’ve thought about? Three, what do you think makes sense, given current circumstances? Four, how will you know you’ve been successful? Five, where will you start? This last one ensures progress. It starts with something as simple as determining what decision you will make in the next two days to show some progress relative to the areas that you have identified by asking the first four questions.
HOW DO WE “GROW” BETTER LEADERS IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR?
Once again, we’re not talking rocket science here. The first is through training, classes and formal education to help with the “be, know, do” stuff that we talked about earlier, the attributes part of the leadership brand equation. In the last number of years, that has been the primary focus of leadership training, where there were assessments and 360-degree feedback and a lot of role-playing and other “soft” stuff. What we’re finding, increasingly, is that the training has to be more results-focused, because if you’re not delivering the results you’re not being a successful leader. The other way is through development – that is, through experience and working with the right mentor or mentors, having challenging job assignments, and learning from experience. Most of our research suggests that good leaders are also very good learners, so we need to give our potential leaders the right experiences under the tutelage of the right types of mentors.
GIVEN THE CURRENT LEADERSHIP CRISIS IN THE CANADIAN FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, IF YOU WERE THE PRIME MINISTER, THE MINISTER RESPONSIBLE FOR THE TREASURY BOARD, OR THE CLERK OF THE PRIVY COUNCIL, HOW WOULD YOU GO ABOUT IMPROVING LEADERSHIP IN THE FEDERAL CIVIL SERVICE?
That’s a good question and not easy to answer in a brief way. I’d make the case that leadership matters and that the quality of our public sector leaders is critical to the effectiveness of our government. I’d ensure that every department and agency comes up with a “leadership brand” statement or something similar to it. And I’d hold leaders to account for the quality of the leaders they create. We can measure the success of an organization’s leadership through 360-degree feedback instruments completed by employees and by the results achieved by departments through evaluations and assessment of annual reports. The right to lead can’t be taken lightly. It needs to be earned. Leadership is so important that if someone isn’t being successful, leadership responsibility can and should be removed, if necessary.
THAT WOULD APPEAR TO BE WHAT THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT IS TRYING TO ACHIEVE WITH ITS MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTABILITY FRAMEWORK (MAF). ARE YOU FAMILIAR WITH IT?
Yes, I am. We find that the degree of success in implementing most frameworks is a function of quality multiplied by acceptance. Most organizations work so hard at making the quality part good, they don’t pay the same attention to building acceptance. So implementation ends up being much lower and more difficult than it should be. I believe that might also be the case with the MAF. The “quality” of the framework is excellent and it would be nearly impossible to disagree with any part of it. But at times it may get so complicated that the “acceptance” does not readily follow. So, high quality times low acceptance means less effective than it should be. The focus should be more on acceptance and use of the ideas than the elegance of the ideas.
Dr. David Ulrich, PhD, has coauthored ten books and over 100 articles. His latest book, “Why the
Bottom Line Isn’t: How to Build Value Through People and Organization”, coauthored with Canadian Norm Smallwood, was published in 2003. He serves on the Board of Directors of Herman Muller and has consulted with more than half of the Fortune 200. He is currently on professorial leave from the
University of Michigan and is serving a three-year term as Mission President for the Church of Jesus Chris of Latter-Day Saints in Montreal. Dr. Ulrich has spoken to Canadian public sector audiences two times in the past year through the Performance and Planning Exchange where he has garnered the two highest speaker ratings in the eight-year history of the organization. For more on Dr. Ulrich’s five steps to better leadership, visit www.rbl.net.
