Sir Andrew Likierman, Professor of Management Practice and dean of London Business School, put together a fascinating piece of research on how business leaders can effectively measure their success. The research entitled, Successful leadership – how would you know? appears on the London Business School’s website. Professor Likierman writes,For those who want to check on their leadership success, for those who appoint leaders and for outsiders (including analysts and competitors) assessing the quality of leadership, checklists of traits are not enough. Nor are comparisons… … What’s needed is how to overcome the measurement problems. So, a number of preliminary steps are necessary to make sure that measurement is robust.
Preliminary step 1: Agree what we’re measuring … note that this is the beginning, not the end of the story…
Preliminary step 2: Focus on outcomes, not inputs … Success is about results, not characteristics.
Preliminary step 3: Make sure the data is as robust as possible…
Once the preliminary steps are taken the Professor recommends you,
Step 1: Set up the framework…
Step 2: Use judgement to interpret…
Step 3: As far as possible, reconcile the needs of different stakeholders…
He concludes,
Successful leadership is about a successful outcome against stated objectives combined with comparisons against a relevant peer group and the way in which opportunities are handled.
Take the time to read this short article, it’s quite prescient, particularly now during such trying financial times.
Recommended Reading – The Best CEOs You Didn’t Know, Forbes
December 23, 2008
Recommended Reading – CEO Succession Planning Lags Badly Research Finds, Stanford Graduate School of Business
June 17, 2010
Recommended Reading – CEO and CFO Career Consequences to Missing Quarterly Earnings Benchmarks – Academic Paper
September 24, 2008
Recommended Reading – SEC Targets CEO Succession Plans – New Risks for Boards, Says Heidrick & Struggles
October 30, 2009
Recommended Reading – Once an Outsider, Always an Outsider? CEO Origin, Strategic Change and Firm Performance – Rice
January 20, 2010
