Internal leadership development usually starts with the move from team member to supervisor. Once the flush of pride wears off, reality sets in and, with it, awareness of the need for new skills both mental and physical.

I went through this. Even when I felt like I had the answers, implementing them was another story. I often felt frustrated and ineffective and I found myself floundering. Luckily, another supervisor named Jim noticed.

Jim came to fill a role that was essential for me at that stage in my life. He became a mentor. He was well-liked and respected by both his peers and upper management and he took the time to help me take some of the guesswork out of leading.

Jim was known for heaping praise on his team members in a sincere, humble way. He was open and fair, and he set clear boundaries and expectations. He put relationships at the heart of everything he did. He knew strong ties between people could create greater success for the entire group.

One Christmas, I saw why his emphasis on relationships was so transformative. A crew was needed to work on Christmas day and no-one volunteered. Jim stepped in and said he’d like to supervise the crew that day. Moved by Jim’s commitment, others began to volunteer.

“You reap what you sow,” he told me later. “When you invest time into your people, you can never go wrong.”

Jim did three things exceedingly well that enabled him to be a successful supervisor. He knew that great leaders:
1.Build relationships.
2.Set expectations.
3.Set boundaries.

Here’s how you can develop each tenet:

How we build relationships

Building relationships involves listening, talking, asking questions, silence, support, showing respect, and being willing to let things go in order to repair ties. It’s a lot to think about and requires real, deliberate thinking and effort.

When supervisors, senior executives, and upper management commit to building healthier relationships in the workforce, the following performance-boosting realities can be cultivated:
A community of people with a shared vision
Partnerships built on trust
New ideas and possibilities
Structured accountability
A sense of belonging
Ability to better recognize when a person is out of sorts

With healthy relationships serving as the living foundation, an organization becomes stronger and more able to adapt––a must if it’s going to survive.

How to set expectations

Clear and achievable expectations help create an environment where success is possible and measurable.
When setting expectations, adhere to the following to ensure that they are honored:
Define and articulate expectations clearly so that workers do not have to guess what is being asked of them.
Never impose an expectation on someone and believe they should know what you wanted.
Ensure that the expectation is within each person’s ability to fulfill.
Allow for and be open to questions; this will help with buy-in. You may even have to adjust the expectation to one that is achievable.
If you set an unrealistic expectation, it WILL NOT be met, and you will be left frustrated.
Allow the worker to share their expectations of you. Yes, they have expectations too––the ones that are discussed with peers in the hallways, bathrooms or over a cold beer when you are not around. Know that when you fail to understand or meet the workers’ expectations, trust and respect will diminish.

How to set boundaries

For relationships to be healthy, they need boundaries. The key to setting boundaries is you and the self-awareness you’re able to foster.

If you can recognize what causes you to feel overwhelmed, emotionally exhausted, frustrated, angry, or just plain indifferent towards another person, you will be able to determine what kind of boundary needs to exist in order to establish a healthy working relationship. The key is to identify the issue without clinging to and cultivating those negative emotions.

In the workplace, one boundary to consider is the process of performance review feedback. How can you praise and/or critique work in a way that ensures the employee hears what you’re saying and that the relationship isn’t just not harmed, but strengthened?

Other boundaries that require special attention include:
Employees that are also friends outside of work
You and your spouse work with the same employer
Family members that are employees

When boundaries are set, expectations are clear, and relationships are strong, teams thrive. Learn this at the start and never forget it

Learn more about Cornerstone’s Executive Coaching or contact the author, Brian Betti

ATLANTA, GA. May 17, 2018 – A global survey into the challenge of future talent planning will probe the impact of the millennial and Gen Z cohort as a workforce majority in the near future. The survey is the 12th annual conducted among global business leaders by Cornerstone International Group, a world ranking executive search and leadership development organization headquartered here and in Shanghai.

“The values of the millennials are playing a major role in changes that are sweeping the workplace”, says Larry Shoemaker, president of both the organization and of the member search firm Cornerstone Atlanta.

“Full-time work is on the decline as incoming employees seek a better work-life balance. Leaders will have to learn to manage a workforce with more contractors, consultants and freelancers.”

The Cornerstone global business survey reflects attitudes and expectations in up to 34 countries where the retained search and leadership development organizations has member offices.

The survey questionnaire can be accessed here, or by going to the global website at www.cornerstone-group.com

The brief survey is open to all senior managers and executives and can be completed anonymously.

“Our global footprint as well as the nature of our business gives as a great opportunity to sample senior management opinion on major business issues,” says Shoemaker.

The report will be issued in mid-June.

For more information:
Tami Fitzpatrick
Executive Administrator
Cornerstone International Group
Tami-Fitzpatrick@cornerstone-group.com

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Editor’s Note: This is the sixth in a series by Ralf Knegtmans of Cornerstone Amsterdam, author of the recent book Agile Talent: Nine Essential Steps for Selecting Tomorrow’s Top Talent.

After years in the executive recruitment field I have come to believe that the proper theoretical background and sufficient practice can help anyone to improve their selection skills. All that is required is a true interest in recruitment paired with a willingness to examine several crucial stages of the selection process. Most of them are hardly rocket science, but some still require more attention than others.

One of the elements that requires extra focus is the use of the feedback form and, more particularly, the weighting of the selection criteria. These are the five or six skills, personality traits and motivational needs discussed earlier in my columns. These criteria are assembled as a joint effort of the selection team and lay the foundation for your focused interview. Most criteria are not equally significant or compelling when you are filling a position, which is why it makes sense to apply weighting.

The best time to do this is when you are deciding on the actual criteria. At that moment your reasons and deliberations are fresh in your mind and all the relevant people are in the session. If you want to do this job well, be sure to include immediate associates and team members in the discussion in addition to the relevant manager.

Ask the assembled group to list the key success factors on a scale from 1 to 5 with 1 being the least important requirement. Most of the time two or three of the (five or six) requirements will score a five. Preferably, you should be compelled to strongly differentiate between the requirements and avoid the temptation to award the bulk of them average significance. When people first start working with this method, they usually find it hard to vary the weighting of the criteria. Nor do they succeed in reaching a consensus straight away.

“If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change!”
Wayne Dyer, author and psychotherapist

One of the advantages of working with very transparent selection criteria (reflected in your weighted feedback form), is being able to offer candidates a better explanation as to why they do not qualify for the job. This more transparent selection process avoids any charge of subjectivity or nepotism.

A second advantage is that it gives you an opportunity to supply your customers with detailed management information on each candidate interviewed or presented. A third is that the selection committee and others involved in the decision are obliged to pay close attention to crucial or non-negotiable criteria. Our firm has encountered several instances of clients believing they had reached a consensus, when it turned out they did not agree on various elements and in fact had divergent job descriptions in mind.

When this happens, it is highly unlikely they will reach an identical judgement, and it is back to the drawing board for everyone.

Completely new job

Sometimes a description of the criteria results in a completely new job description. I remember the time we were approached to search for a Marketing Director for an international transportation company. We discovered when determining together the criteria for the focused interview that they were really looking for a Business Development Director.

Every new search calls for a thorough examination to discover what is at the heart of the position, to uncover which criteria are crucial or non-negotiable, and to provide reasons for those criteria. At first you will likely have some difficulty defining the five or six ultimate criteria for the position that you simply refuse to compromise on.

Devising an effective form for your feedback which includes weighted or categorized criteria, is something of a repetitive journey. Your level of understanding will grow as you become more astute at drawing up the criteria and subsequent weighting. This is a perfect match for agile ways of working: try a lot of stuff and keep what works. As you try a variety of things, you continue to adjust your method based on your experience and the latest information.

Method of ‘blind analysis’

One way to increase the agility and objectivity of your feedback form is to separate the people who devise the criteria and have those who are going to conduct the interview decide the weighting. Physicists call this method ‘blind analysis’. It results in less bias and prejudice, something you should always aim for while selecting the best people for your company or customers.

Banks in the past have been able to count on a stable customer base.

In the business sector they have traditionally been confident of the loyalty of their SME and corporate customers, because all have more than one bank. In the retail market, many people – particularly in Europe – would bank where their parents banked.

This is changing rapidly. With customer-building opportunities created by new and different types of products and services and with Fintechs and third-party providers competing for the same customers, banks have graduated from tracking the customer journey to tracking and nurturing the customer experience.

Tomas Podmesil, co-designer/developer of KPMG’s global CX method; indicated that we are currently living in the age of customer personalization. Product cycles are increasingly faster and customer influence that much greater, thanks to the overwhelming impact of social media. His model involves six factors of various importance, from Integrity to Empathy, influencing the process of the customer experience.

Weapons of Mass Destruction

But adding the ingredient of social media is equivalent to handing the public – customers and non-customers alike – “weapons of mass destruction” , which have made it impossible to deny poor performance but enable multiplication and promotion of a positive one, giving the customer experience an unprecedented degree of importance.

Companies such as the Polish start-up Y Bank are built on this business mode- becoming the “Amazon” of Financial Services by offering a bevy of products from different banks and tailoring them to the end customer. They will also be keeping a close eye on the customer experience and ranking their products and providers accordingly.

A Customer Experience Leader at a large bank spoke to me of the challenges for a large bank moving into the “age of the customer.” A major task is having to transform their huge, product and process driven organization with its IT legacy systems to a customer centric focus, a massive burden which is unnecessary in an agile Fintech or greenfield bank.

Most Trusted Banks are the New Ones

Confirming this, a recent KPMG global study indicated that in Czech Republic & Slovakia banks were the top three most trusted companies – but these were the new and greenfield banks.

The Customer Experience Leader, relating his bank´s journey, explained they converted from a strategy based on number of customers to one of achieving highly satisfied customers who would promote and recommend the bank to others. In other words, the old fashioned and powerful word-of-mouth endorsement, but with the huge multiplying effect of social networks.

Another major change observed is the birth of a new kind of strategy consultancy returning to the basics. FreieBanker is just one example of a boutique strategy consultancy focusing on helping banks discover their statement of purpose.

In the case of the Customer Experience leader, her bank’s purpose was determined to be “to help clients, companies, and society to achieve prosperity.” They then started charting how the customer journey and experience matched up to that purpose.

Do I Get the Loan?

In one example, they believed that loan processing was an important factor for customers. Instead, they discovered that customers were less concerned about the time needed to process a loan but wanted more predictability regarding the loan approval. In this manner, banks are now working closely with their customers as they develop processes or products in order to meet their expectations.

The issues are complex and made even more so by parallel developments aimed at reinforcing the privacy of personal data, an entirely different issue.

As lawyer Andreas Fillman of Squire Boggs points out, developing a better customer experience requires new data and having a trusted relationship as far as personal data is concerned. That is a red-flag issue and the challenge at the top of the list in 2018 will be balancing, on the one hand, the data privacy legislation looming in the form of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) due in May, and on the other hand, the launch of the new payment services directive (PSD2) offering customers new services through third party providers.

And until both are in effect, the questions and challenges facing banks and their customers will be whether third party providers will be able to offer a great customer experience and, at the same time, respect the data privacy rights of the customers in the same way in which the banks are regulated.

SHANGHAI, CN, February 6, 2017 — China’s New Year last week celebrates the return of the Year of the Rooster after 12 years, in line with the cycle of the Chinese Zodiac.  According to Shanghai business executive James Ng, the country addresses not only a new year but a new normal.

“We are entering a crucial stage of economic transformation, “says Ng, Managing Partner of Cornerstone International Group, a global executive search organization with 18 of 61 offices in Asia-Pacific.

“We are going from an old model of investment, export and low-end manufacturing focus of 12 years ago into a new model driven by the consumption and the services sectors and supported by the 13^th Five Year Plan (2016-2020).”

Writing in the Cornerstone International Group blog,  Ng describes a China confronted with declining growth, rising costs, an aging society, increasing competition and more demanding customers. Surveys conducted by both American and European chambers echo a pessimistic outlook including regulatory issues and lack of right talents.

However, pessimistic here is relative.  After decades of 9% growth, the IMF expects China’s GDP growth to soften to 6.5% in 2017, but that is still two times faster than world average. The incremental GDP of USD 800 billion, based upon GDP size of USD 12 trillion, is equivalent to an entire Netherlands.

Private consumption will be the key growth driver in 2017, expected to contribute more than half of economy growth. Higher GDP per capita forecast at USD 8,929, coupled with growing momentum from urban and middle classes, the millennial generation and online commerce are expected to fuel domestic consumption growth at around 10%.

China’s economic transformation has been impressive, offering many lessons as well as challenges. You can read more about China’s New Normal here. 

There should be very few people left who do not believe in assessments when they are hiring a senior level or key replacement.

They would include people who do not appreciate the true cost of a failed C-level hire (46% of whom will indeed fail within 18 months); people who still think it is a hirer’s market out there (which it hasn’t been for a decade); or people who still rely on a gut feeling or hire on a hunch.

Others, notably the best-in-class crowd, consistently use assessments and recognize that they are indispensable in finding and confirming high potential talent.

Assessments today are extremely sophisticated and claim a long line of benefits resulting from intelligent application.    Today’s psychometric are powerful and measure potential in many different ways that will enhance productivity and reduce the cost of hiring

However, don’t try this at home.  Advanced procedures require in-depth training both to apply and interpret, meaning you should be satisfied about your recruiter’s certification before proceeding.

A while back, the Aberdeen Group ran a blog post listing the five top reasons you should be using assessments.

  Here they are:

1. Data Trumps Hunches, Always.

With the power of measurable data on your candidates at your fingertips, gone are the days of making a decision on a gut feeling or a hunch. Interviews – which are difficult to keep strictly standardized – can’t effectively be used alone in making hiring decisions.

2. You Can Measure the Whole Person.

Intelligence and prior work history are not the only factors you should consider! Assessments can provide a thorough understanding of the (4) important facets in seeking the right candidate for a particular role: Can Do, Will Do, Will Fit, and Can Lead.

3. Effective Talent Measurement Can Increase Legal Defensibility.

By using a more standardized, objective approach to hiring through the use of assessments, you can make a more unbiased apples-to-apples comparison between various candidates. Validation data can be used to make sure that the assessments you’re using are good predictors for success in a specific job.

4. Assessments Yield a “Prescription” for Development Programs.

If you don’t fully understand an employee’s strengths and weaknesses in the beginning, how can you build a meaningful development plan or identify high potential and leadership candidates? By using assessment data collected during hiring, you’ll be ready to engage your new employee in a tailored development program.

5. You Can’t Afford Not To.

It’s more than just the team’s morale that takes a blow when you hire or promote the wrong person. Studies show it could cost up to 150% of that person’s salary to replace them.

You can read the full post here

Taru Hermunen-Kuusela is Business Developer and Trainer with a strong coaching and solution focused touch in building capacities and capabilities, processes and systems for modern leadership of people and organizations. Taru has a strong background in consulting and project management within development coordination and experience in professional coaching and training both individuals and teams, as well as large audiences. Further, she has expertise in digital marketing and the growing world of on-line coaching and training courses from their planning and set-up to successful execution.

Taru holds a M.Sc. degree in Planning Geography supported with her later studies in coaching, entrepreneurship training, pedagogy, positive and golf psychology, and digital marketing.

– See more at: http://www.cornerstone-group.com/2016/03/10/cornerstone-global-executive-search-group-opens-japan/#sthash.7aOWEnJp.dpuf