The Job, No Leader should Delegate..

Having Right People in the Right Place.

Given many things that businesses' can't control, from the uncertain state of economy to the unpredictable actions of the competitors. From environment to  disease outbreak resulting to forced lock down, most of us witnessed during recent worldwide pandemic.

You would think companies would pay careful attention to one thing they can control - the quality of their people, especially those in the leadership pool. Any corporations' human beings are the most reliable resources for generating excellent results year after year. Their judgments, experiences, and capabilities make the difference between success and failure.

Yet some leaders, while they talk of people as their most important asset, usually do not think very hard about choosing the right people for the right jobs.

Why The Right People Aren't in the Right jobs?

Common sense tells us that the right people have to be in the right jobs. Yet so often the aren't. What accounts for the mismatches we see every day? Following are a few of my observations and learning, through out my Corporate career of decades of working with various large corporations:

1). Lack of Knowledge: Leaders often rely on staff appraisals that focus on - may be the wrong criteria, or they might take a fuzzy and meaningless recommendation for someone a direct report. Direct report recommends to the leader- "Bob's a great leader and a great motivator". The leader fails to enquire about the specific qualities that makes Bob a right candidate for the job. May be the job has not been defined by the leader himself to his direct report before asking for his recommendations. He has not defined in terms of three of four non-negotiable criteria.

2). Lack of Courage:  Most people know someone in the organisation who doesn't perform well, yet manages to keep his job year after year. The usual reason, we find, is that the person's leader does not have emotional fortitude to confront him and take decisive actions. Such failures can can do considerable damage to a business. If the non-performers are high enough in the organisation, it can be destroyed.

3). The Psychological Comfort Factor: Many jobs are filed with the wrong people because the leaders who promote them are comfortable with them.Its natural for executives to develop a sense of loyalty to those they have worked with over time, particularly if they have come to trust their judgments. But it is a serious problem when the loyalty is based on wrong factors. For Example- the leader may be comfortable with the person because that person thinks like him and does not challenge him, or has developed a skill of insulating the boss from conflict. Or the leader may favor people who are part of same social network, built up over years in the organisation.

4). Lack of Personal Commitment: When the right people are not in right jobs, the problem is visible and transparent. Leaders know intuitively that they have a problem and will often readily acknowledge it.But an alarming number of leaders do not do anything to rectify this problem. Leader cannot simply fix this problem by issuing directives.

Leaders need to spend at least 40-45% of their time  effort,and emotional energy to - Selecting, Appraising,and Developing people.

BOTTOM LINE

The foundation of a great company is the way it develops people - providing the right experiences, such a learning in different jobs / departments, learning from other people, giving candid feedbacks, proving coaching , education and training. If Leader spends substantial amount of time and energy developing people and assigning right people to right jobs, the payoff will come in form of  Sustainable Competitive Advantage.