Cross-Training in Business and Executive Development

I enjoyed reading “Making yourself indispensable” by John Zenger, Joseph Folkman and Scott Edinger in the October 2011 issue of Harvard Business Review. (The authors are the CEO, president and executive vice president of Zenger Folkman, a leadership development consultancy. They are also the authors of The Inspiring Leader, published by McGraw-Hill in 2009.) The authors argue that, to make it to the top, executives must develop skills that complement what they already do best, in the spirit of cross-training common among world-class athletes.

For instance, “an experienced marathoner won’t get significantly faster merely by running ever longer distances. To reach the next level, he needs to supplement that regimen by building up complementary skills through weight training, swimming, bicycling, interval training, yoga and the like.” The authors refer to this as nonlinear development and apply this idea to leadership competencies. I appreciated how they were able to connect their arguments about nonlinearities to hard numbers gleaned from their database of 360-degree surveys of developing leaders, such as:

• Only 14% of leaders who scored in the 75^th percentile in focusing on results but weren’t as strong in building relationships reached the 90^th percentile in overall leadership effectiveness (called the extraordinary leadership level).
• Only 12% of leaders who scored in the 75^th percentile in building relationships but weren’t as strong in focusing on results reached the extraordinary leadership level.
• 72% of individuals performing well in both categories reached the extraordinary leadership level.

The authors also provide a helpful exhibit, called “What skills will magnify my strengths?”, to help executives decide how best to cross-train in the business world using their inventory of 16 key strengths (p.88-89 of the magazine). The article is full of non-trivial insights and well-thought-out arguments. For instance, they argue that what makes leaders indispensable is “being uniquely outstanding at a few things” (as opposed to good at many).

• Executives in their databases who had no skill in the 90^th percentile (i.e., no profound strength) scored on average in the 34^th percentile in leadership effectiveness.
• With one outstanding skill, their overall leadership effectiveness score rose to the 64^th percentile. (In other words, executives jumped from the bottom third to the top third by simply having one top strength.)
• With two outstanding skills, their leadership score increased to the 72^nd percentile, and 81^st with three outstanding skills. (Check the article for the numbers corresponding to four or five outstanding skills.)

The authors give some guidelines to select a strength to focus on and identify complementary behaviors.

I found the article to be truly innovative, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it ends up being recognized as one of the best HBR articles of the year. I highly recommend it. A must-read.

Comments

[Aurelie Thiele]

As an example, the article uses the example of an executive named "Tom", who decides to focus on the strength of "inspiring and motivating others" after being passed over for a promotion. This strength has 10 competency companions (see p.89/90), among which Tom selected "communicating powerfully and broadly" as the skill he wanted to improve. He then solicited feedback from another company employee whose communication skills he admired, who made specific suggestions (detailed in the article) for Tom to improve that strength. (The authors also provide additional advice for executives who may not know someone able to provide feedback.) 15 months later, Tom learned he had moved to the 82nd percentile in his ability to inspire.

This was a great read that got me thinking about the strengths I want to improve and provided clear guidelines on how to proceed.

[Flinchbaugh]

I thought it was a good article as well. It is always a tough decision when developing yourself, or developing others, of what to focus on. Sometimes the advice is to build your strengths. Sometimes it is to improve your weaknesses. The way I would phrase this article, at least in that context, is "improve the weaknesses that best multiply the impact of your strengths", or something that sounds more artfully articulated than that.

So much is written about leadership development. Some of it is from the board perspective (I recently renamed a Compensation Committee I chair to the Leadership Development and Compensation Committee). Some of it from the Executive perspective. Some of it from the HR perspective. In the end, the most effective and powerful influence on deciding and developing capabilities should be yourself.

Jamie Flinchbaugh
www.jamieflinchbaugh.com

[Aurelie Thiele]

"Improve the weaknesses that best multiply the impact of your strengths"... I like that! That's a great way to summarize the article. I thought the idea of cross-training was original, but you're right - so much has been written about leadership that it is hard to decide what to pay attention to. (I find Leadership Development and Compensation Committee to be a far better title, by the way. After all, compensation is supposed to be tied to employees' skills and development.)

My favorite part of the article was to read the set of 16 skills and ask myself which ones I was showing and which ones I should improve on. It helped identify areas of improvement that I hadn't put in words in before. Of course, nothing beats "Leadership without easy answers" by Ronald Heifetz, which is my favorite leadership book.