Our current economic conditions place different demands on our leaders and this in turn places a new level of pressure on the critical task of recruiting the right people to senior posts in your organisation and supporting them in doing a great job.  No surprise then to read a request for ideas from one of my colleagues on the Training Journal Daily Digest.  This was my response:

You are looking at how you integrate your senior executives into your organisation in the best possible way to increase their effectiveness and help them deal with changes in organisational culture. You are particularly interested to learn how other large organisations manage the process and any thoughts or information on best practice or leading edge.

I am offering a few ideas based on my experience of conducting research into effective leadership over many years and helping client organisations to apply it, via executive assessments, coaching etc. Here’s a quick brainstorm and I’d be delighted to speak with you if you would value chewing over a few ideas at some point:

• I would say that nine tenths of ‘getting it right’ happens before your senior executives join the company. There are two things in particular, here. The first is establishing and conducting a dialogue with prospective executives which allows both parties to assess the extent of the match. This requires you to be scrupulously honest (with yourselves and with prospective candidates) about your agenda. The second is conducting an assessment of your candidates which is effective in establishing whether they have the skills and competencies needed for the job. I have seen any number of senior hirings fail because one of these two issues has not been addressed effectively;
• Perhaps it’s worth mentioning a third aspect of this pre-recruitment dialogue, speaking as someone who conducts executive assessments on behalf of client organisations. I have seen people fail whom I have assessed and when I have told clients that they are not a good match for the job. This has never done my business any harm – it tends to strengthen my credibility and to provide an opportunity for dialogue with my client which strengthens my relationship with clients. I do recommend that you consider what third-party support you use in the hiring process and pay attention to your relationship with your partners in the assessment process;
• Research shows that the most effective leaders, when they start a new job, spend time gathering information and shaping their agenda and your focus needs to be on supporting this. For your senior hires, this involves getting out and meeting key people including peers and those people they are leading. So, if you are serious about integrating senior executives into the organisation you will support this process of dialogue and you may want to play a role in it – giving regular time to newly-hired executives to discuss what they are finding and what plans they are shaping;
• There’s another category of new hires that often fails – this is when organisations bring in people with the aim of shaking the place up a bit and then make it very difficult for the new executive to fulfil this remit. I wonder if this is what you are talking about when you mention ‘changes in organisation culture’. If you want new executives to thrive in a culture that is serving your organisation well why not recruit to match in the first place? If you want them to have an effect on changing the culture you need to be honest with yourselves – what are you really ready for? – and also recruit people with the necessary skills. I have seen people recruited who are steeped in a culture to which organisations aspire but who have no skills in bridging the gap between cultures and taking people with them. They get rejected by people in organisations pretty quickly;
• I want to declare my interest as a coach when I say that there may be times when Executive Coaching can play a role in supporting the new senior executive. Some senior hires will bring their executive coach with them as a matter of course. It’s also been my experience that some organisations have seen the opportunity to bridge the assessment process with life in the organisation by hiring me as a coach: this is particularly effective when the assessment indicates some growth areas for the executive if he or she is to be effective or if the agenda in the new role is stretching for the organisation.

I notice I could go on! A couple of books spring to mind: Watkins’ The First 90 Days and Wageman and others’ Senior Leadership Teams. The first offers advice for the new hire and may offer pointers for the hiring organisation. The second talks about research into effective conditions for senior leadership teams. This points to a key factor for me – unless you have the right people in place in the right teams with the right conditions any amount of support to the new hire may be wasted.

PS Just to let you know, as a member of Amazon Associates UK, I shall receive a referral fee for any books you buy using the links in this posting.