Driving Key Performance Outcomes Through High-ROI Leadership

Every successful business trains its employees. But how is this leadership development measured? Is it measured at all?

Attaching an ROI to leadership development is critical to building better teams, enhancing effectiveness, and boosting the bottom line.

Engaging with a leadership development partner that doesn’t measure its outcomes is like throwing darts in the dark – the results are hard to see.

The John Maxwell Company leverages a validated diagnostic assessment that detects healthy, effective, and at risk behaviors and practices for leadership teams, boards, and owners who are seeking to expand growth and sustain enterprise success.

Our Organizational Effectiveness Survey (OES) asks pointed, pre-engagement questions that uncover key data insights related to:

• Overall Health of Culture: Does your company have a leadership culture focused on change, improvement and optimization?

• Willingness to Change and Improve: Are your leaders transforming skilled people into engaged employees; are these employees willing to follow your leaders?

• Employee Engagement: Are your employees committed to their work and organization in a way that drives consistent productivity?

• Customer Satisfaction: How important is customer care and the customer experience to your organization’s leadership team?

OES takes the temperature of your organization before, during and after the deployment of our leadership development solutions, empowering your leaders with data on behaviors and practices that drive key performance outcomes.

All information from the OES can be analyzed and reported by multiple demographics and organizational departments, zones, regions, and districts. This gives you a high-level view of the challenges facing your organization, and how best you can attack and overcome them through leadership development.

WHY MEASURE LEADERSHIP EFFECTIVENESS?

Executive coaching is an impactful way to assess and improve the effectiveness of an organization. According to a study published by the Center for Creative Leadership, 95 percent of people polled stated that executive coaching was worth the time and effort. Ninety-five percent.

Companies that can attach an ROI to their executive coaching and leadership development programs further enhance the health of their organizations. The OES identifies 28 behavioral and business practice competencies within 4 functions of the organization: Leadership, People, Strategy and Performance. Insights related to these specific areas enable leaders to respond to major issues such as productivity and turnover. The OES assesses what is going well and offers warning signs of organizational at-risk behaviors and business practices that if not caught soon enough can negatively impact overall performance, growth, and financial results.

I’ve said it many times: Leadership is not a position, but a process — and one well-worth the investment. If leadership development is made a priority, your company will retain more engaged employees, which will directly impact productivity and profit.

A culture of leadership must be built in layers, over time, and takes constant nurturing. Watering your plants is essential, yes, but you must also measure them on a consistent basis to ensure a healthy growth track.

THE LEADERSHIP RELAY

According to Deloitte Human Capital Trends, 56 percent of executives report their companies are not ready to meet leadership needs, and only 7 percent report that their companies have accelerated leadership programs for millennials — even though the Insured Retirement Institute predicts that through 2030, baby boomers will retire at a staggering rate of 10,000 per day.

High-ROI leadership development will be key in securing seamless transitions in management that will occur over the next decade. It’s time for companies to look forward, constantly assessing and encouraging the leadership qualities of their younger, or perhaps, newer employees.

Remember that while leadership trickles downward, a strong leadership culture is about creating an environment where every employee feels a capacity to lead.

THE INTANGIBLE ASPECTS OF COMPANY CULTURE

While benefits and workplace flexibility are frequently discussed topics of company culture and work happiness, the intangible aspects of company culture are far more important to worker loyalty and productivity. What are these intangible aspects?

Companies that foster collaboration (when possible) and a team mentality through inclusive leadership perform better. Strong leadership qualities of communication, empathy, and service translate into a respectful, engaging, and exciting workplace.

But this is not exclusive to work output. In fact, 90 percent of startup investors often value the quality of the founding team — and the interaction between them — as the single most non-financial factor in evaluating an IPO, according to the McKinsey Institute.

INVESTING IN THE FUTURE

A successful model of leadership promotes personal growth. Measurable mentorship programs and professional development opportunities in the form of continuing education, advanced certification, and taking on new roles or additional responsibilities that are then recognized by management are crucial to your employees feeling encouraged to set and pursue goals and develop skills.

Moreover, according to the 2017 TINYPulse Employee Engagement Report, employees who have access to professional development are 10 percent more likely to stay with their company.

Using a tool like our OES helps your company measure the effectiveness of your current culture. It lets your senior decision-makers know where to focus energy and resources in terms of leadership development. High-ROI solutions drive deeper engagement with employees because they prove value. This inspires commitment from employees and drives a culture of accountability.

Employees invest in a company that they feel invests in them. It’s as simple and as difficult as that.

The John Maxwell Podcast