The Future of Leadership Development is Bright.
Developing the next generation of leaders
Over the years, I have had many opportunities to observe a full range of leaders in action. Good leaders, bad leaders, junior leaders, senior leaders, and the state of your leadership development pipeline are a pretty good proxy for how competitive you are and will remain in the years to come. Our business schools teach us there are six overarching styles tucked under three major types: Authoritarian, Democratic, and Laissez-Faire.
This blog is not intended to address the value of any one style over the other. It is intended to discuss Leadership Development and to let you in on a series of conversations I had over the past week in the expectation that they provide some useful insights. These discussions went right to the heart of the leadership development dilemma--the paucity of leadership today and what in God’s name will it look like in the future?!
So I began the week by reading an opinion piece by Sully Sullenberger. Sully is the celebrated pilot who landed US Airways Flight 1549 on the Hudson River a decade ago. Like the best leaders, Sully credited those around him for the “Miracle on the Hudson” but acknowledged his role as the leader and person ultimately responsible for outcomes.
He correctly identified key hallmarks of skilled leadership: responsibility, competence, integrity, and a concern for the greater good. He then used that position to segue into his point of current political leaders failing miserably to live up to these four elementary components of leadership.
Millennial Leadership Development
Later in the week, I met with a young woman, a member of Gen X. She self-described it as “the irrelevant generation”. According to her, Gen X laments that marketers are focused on baby boomers and the millennials at the expense of her generation.
She demonstrated how universally true it is for each generation to criticize the one that went before it and to some extent how leadership programs are failing to bridge this communication gap. How true heh?
As true as this is, it is equally true that as each younger generation matures, they take on many of the values they once rebelled against to create a new normal in style and thought. As if to demonstrate that point, she came around to holding up the generation behind her for their talent, drive, and yes, leadership potential.
I’ve seen this same recognition within a large healthcare client who has five generations in their workforce. Five generations with different perspectives on how things should be done. Five generations who grew up criticizing the generation behind it and who now has team members often reporting to a member of that later generation.
That’s right, a 60-year-old reporting to a 40-year-old or younger. How’s that going to work?
It won’t, not without adequate investment in leadership programs and a focus on behaviors that are aligned with the overall mission. Intentionally working on your corporate culture and augmenting development opportunities with or leadership coaching are just two examples of things organizations can explore to tap into the talent within their organizations.
This organization with 30,000 employees, to its credit, has asked us to help them create a millennial leadership development program to identify those emerging leaders with the competencies needed to lead in the future. I’m encouraged!
Leadership and the Race to Cuba
As I wound down the week, I couldn’t help but think back to one of the clearest examples of why I think we as a country are in good hands. Why our family businesses will survive under future generations of leadership. The ship I featured at the beginning of this article is the Tall Ship Lynx. She is a replica of an 1812 Baltimore Schooner that President Madison commissioned as a privateer in the War of 1812.
The Lynx Education Foundation owns her and uses her to teach fifth-graders about the role that war played in our County’s history. The war of 1812 secured the freedoms our country fought for in 1776--freedoms we all enjoy today.
She is crewed by this group of millennials with the exception of one old salt and our education director. I had the privilege of sailing to Cuba in the resurrection of an annual race from St. Petersburg, Florida. This race had not been held in the fifty years following Castro’s overthrow of Fulgencio Batista, former President of Cuba.
I spent a close quarter’s week with this group, who I had not known before we set sail. During this time, I was able to observe a microcosm of what’s possible when an organization of competent individuals sharing a vision, who take ownership and responsibility while coveting integrity can accomplish.
This very diverse group of young people, who came to live on the ship from very different places, was exemplary in how they worked together as they discharged their duties. They demonstrated a sense of team and support for one another. There were no laggards to be sure.
The course was planned. The alternative scenarios were discussed. The captain, a 29-year-old seaman, was competent beyond his years. He was clear in what he wanted to be done when he made a decision. His first mate was a shining example of clear communication down the chain of command.
Nothing was lost in translation as the crew executed their orders with skills honed by practice. This was the perfect example of what we should aspire to in our companies.
This is the kind of corporate culture that ensures we have a sustainable competitive advantage in any situation. Leadership demands we be vigilant for the kind of future leaders, talented, committed professionals, who with training and support can be relied on to lead the next generation of workers. Our workers, their families, and the communities we live in are counting on it. The future is in good hands if you nurture it.
