One of the challenges that senior leadership teams face is what I call an "interesting duality."
On on hand, a senior leader is often responsible for a functional unit or team within an organization. On the other hand, they are asked to be on a team with other leaders - usually headed by a Director, VP, or CEO.
My clients often ask me,"How big should our team be?"
My answer is typically...it depends.
It depends on the purpose of the team.
The challenge on many teams is a lack of clarity about a team's true purpose. In most cases, team's don't even know that they don't know their purpose.
This is usually a bigger issue at the senior leadership team level, where a CEO, VP, or Director leads a
team of other leaders.
I have found myself reading works by Napoleon Hill, an American author who was one of the earliest producers of the modern genre of personal success literature. In the early nineteen hundreds, Andrew Carnegie commissioned him to interview over 500 successful men and women in order to discover and publish their formula for success.
Last week Dick Winters died at age 92.
He was described in a Wall Street Journal article as the leader of a valiant World War II paratrooper company that became famous a half-century later in historian Stephen Ambrose's Band of Brothers. I first read the book while I was on active duty, and then later watched the HBO miniseries (about 10 times).
I had an interesting hut trip experience this past weekend. A group of friends and I skied into a very difficult hut near Vail Pass. The 7 mile approach took over 9 hours, as we endured steep and technical terrain to get to our destination at 11,200 feet above sea level. On Sunday, the area was socked in with almost a foot of fresh snow. With the winds picking up and the snow continuing, we made a decision to take a longer but less technical route back to the trail head.
The Leadership Story
It had been almost three weeks since their last one-on-one, but having returned from India and with Angela's sudden departure, Steve was anxious to get the process started again. He reflected on how easy it was for pressing matters to get in the way of focusing on important things like coaching his people.
Ben was rushed and a bit frustrated that he had to attend this one on one. Especially today, it seemed there were so many deadlines waiting on his attention.
In my last blog post, I talked about a client I worked with in Fort Collins, Colorado and how important it is to have clarity about your senior leadership team's purpose.
But let me take a step back.
I recently worked with a team in Fort Collins, Colorado helping them build alignment and cohesion.
The CEO was a technologist. The Sales VP wanted to see a more sales-driven organization. The Engineering VP needed more engineers to meet the demands of a singificant customer contract. The CFO wanted to instill process and financial discipline. The HR VP was mostly focused on administration.
Each person came to the team with his/her own agenda and vision.
The team was a mess.
