Maverick Mastery®

In my opinion, CEOs are extremely brave people. After years of establishing expertise in one or two key functional areas or industries; they take up a role in which they are expected to be able to understand and master all the different aspects of the business! From day one, CEOs have all the accountability in defining the company, ensuring that they have an efficient and effective Board. They also need to have an employee culture that empowers the employees and satisfies the customers, and a business model that really works. This requires a high level of aptitude across a number of competencies, failure in any one area can have a disastrous effect on the company.

Often the success of a company rests on the leadership abilities of the CEO. When in situ they are expected to need little professional development, to be a charismatic leader, an effective manager, knowledge of their industry and emerging trends and an ability to understand the differing activities of the business that makes up the whole. The more complex the company is, the higher the level of expectation that is placed upon them.

But to make things worse, new CEOs typically have on average just 2 years to deliver!

To ensure that they deliver what is expected of them, productive CEOs must ensure the successful marriage of their own management and leadership skills. In this context, management can be defined as the ability to make good decisions and leadership as the ability to execute those decisions through others. These CEOs often hire the services of an external mentor.

What is mentoring and does it differ from coaching?

Coaching begins with the premise that the answers are within the person being coached. The coach’s role is to help the individual understand that and via the use of encouraging and questioning techniques, helps elicit the solution. A coach is non directional and never provides advice.

By contrast a mentor is an expert who provides guidance and advice within a more developmental relationship. Mentoring requires flexibility of the mentor and their ability to use a wide range of techniques to guide the mentee.

Why do productive CEOs think mentoring is essential to their success and their business?

There is a high expectation from shareholders, the Board, employees and other stakeholders that the CEO is always able to clearly assess the optimum direction of the company. He is always self assured, confident and has high self esteem and can easily handle difficult situations with the Board without doubt and with aplomb.

CEOs face many important strategic decisions and to confide that they are uncertain can signal a vulnerability that may weaken their position, and cause doubt in their subordinates. This can be disastrous especially in times when the company is going through major change such as a merger or acquisition, downsizing, a strategic re direction or restructure.

There can be times when the CEO is unsure of whom to trust in his organisation especially if he is experiencing doubt in a decision that he needs to make. It can be lonely at the top especially if there isn’t someone trustworthy to confide in.

Having an objective sounding board

Often a productive and efficient CEO wishes to try out or test new ideas prior to sharing them with his fellow Board members. This enables him to ensure that new ideas are fully assessed and are in sufficient shape prior to the scrutiny that he will receive from his Board.

By working with his mentor he is able to role play the likely resistance that he may receive and therefore be more prepared when it comes to discussing his ideas. He can ensure that he is taking an objective stance rather than an emotional one and is being as strategic or operational in outlook as the situation requires.

Receiving support and advice on team dynamics

Not every Board is as productive or efficient as it should be. This may be because of the way that the CEO is interacting with the other members. If this is the case then the mentor can provide objective advice on how he can be more effective in this arena.

Sometimes the team itself is dysfunctional and is therefore unable to achieve its strategic goals, whilst the CEO is usually able to analyse the reason for the dysfunction he is not always sure how to address the problem. This can be especially true when the reason for dysfunction is due to the personalities of the team, or particular loyalty to their own department.

It is common for mentors to attend the occasional Board meeting (or key meeting) to observe the way the CEO interacts with his team as well as how the team interacts as a whole. The insight that the mentor provides can enable the CEO to clearly see how to improve the dynamics of the team and improve its productivity and efficiency.

Staying ahead of the game by receiving knowledge from other industries

The best mentors work across industries therefore easily transferring best practice from one industry to the next. This enables the CEO to remain fresh and able to more closely identify emerging trends within his own area, through more objective thinking.

The CEO broadens his horizons and experience by working with an external mentor. One way of achieving this is by leveraging the knowledge of the mentor and being able to challenge what is perceived as the only effective way to get something done.

Continuous CEO development

Once an executive becomes a CEO it is often assumed that he no longer needs any further development. This can be a flawed assumption especially when contemplating the role and responsibilities that the CEO faces, often in a challenging and competitive environment. Mentoring enables the CEO to recognise their own abilities and limitations in a safe environment therefore ensuring that their abilities are enhanced and limitations developed into strengths. Where necessary, tasks are delegated to enable the CEO to fulfil his strategic role successfully.

An external mentor ensures that the CEO remains challenged, motivated and constantly learning/developing. This enables the company to reap the benefit of a CEO continuously challenging their own assumptions, someone with a clear strategic focus and who can expertly marry the need to demonstrate clear leadership, efficient management and effective communication.

A more successful and sustainable company

Numerous research studies show that how a company is led is what makes the difference between successful and sustainable companies and failures. External mentors have the unique ability to assist the CEO and at times the leadership team in taking a more objective and strategic approach. They enable employee development, clarity of thinking and enhanced communication skills and team dynamics.

Does mentoring always work?

There are only two main reasons why mentoring doesn’t work. If there is a bad fit between the mentor and mentee or if the CEO is not ready to be open and honest with his mentor and be willing to move out of his comfort zone.

For example, I was working with an established CEO who had recently moved to a new company. The company was very dysfunctional; his top team was inefficient beset with personality and competency issues, poor morale issues amongst the employees and severe union issues. To add to his problems they were losing key customers, haemorrhaging money and the shareholders were not happy. They gave him a very tight timescale in which to achieve turnaround results.

The CEO was unable to confide in his team and was unclear as to where the true starting point was and whether there was a common root to the company’s issued.

By working closely together he was able to see clearly the issues that were faced by the company. To segregate the problems caused by his top team and the consequences of devalued and de-motivated employees. By tackling these key areas, he understood that these were the causes of customer dissatisfaction and poor bottom line results.

He learnt that his own leadership style was adding to the problem and how best to interact with others to ensure that he got the results that he wanted. He understood how to get the best out of his team and how to implement the best processes to deal with the technical deficiencies.

Under his tenure the company improved its fortunes, his team increased their competence and the union difficulties improved as they saw the employees being better treated. This had a positive effect on the bottom line. The CEO benefited from having a trusted advisor who was removed from the company, who could provide objective guidance and advice.

Mentoring is often much more beneficial to CEO’s than traditional coaching practices as it provides senior management with an external sounding bound, someone who can practically assess and advise on the problematic issues within the organisation as a whole, and will not just sit back and wait for the answers to ‘come from within’. Mentoring works when the CEO understands the needs to be challenged and to continue his personal development to realise his achievements and to ensure the likelihood of his company’s success.

Maverick’s can be an essential asset to any company however many are misunderstood and are often seen as being disruptive. In this article I look  at the role of Mavericks within any business and how to best harness their talent.

There are a lot of HR people who still play at the administrative level rather than the strategic level so businesses miss out a lot of key advice and help. My role in HR led me to mentoring as this it is about making sure the business meets it’s objectives through effective use of it’s people.

Within many organisations today there are problems with office culture. This needs to be altered before changes can happen. The first step is understanding what the culture is and what are the major drivers.

One of the first things you have to look at is which is the culture that the board thinks is the right culture in terms of their market place and how they want to achieve this. Without top level agreement from the board, there is no point in doing it. Once you have done that, it is a simple case of working backwards. It is all about behaviour. You cannot change people’s attitudes and belief systems because you told them to do it but by actually getting them to change their behaviour, they change themselves.

If you have a management team that does not take talent very seriously, and will not be held accountable for, they could be promoted without caring about whether their staff have been developed properly. Therefore one of the things you could change within a culture is training and mentoring, but also the senior managements pay structure. This means that they won’t get paid unless they reach certain development targets for their staff. Quite often, one of the ways to change a member’s behaviour towards their staff is to build it into the current structures that are already there.

What is a Maverick….

In my role as HR I quite often get asked to help manage Mavericks, often known as troublesome talent. A Maverick is someone that is wilfully independent. Mavericks can be divided into two categories, someone with a Maverick personality who is very wilful, and then you have people that have Maverick tendencies who in certain specific areas are wilful and that means that their work will be very different to anyone else in the industry.

Within companies we need to encourage Maverick tendencies and be very aware of Maverick personalities. Mavericks are really the ones that can help turn around businesses. They make up 20% of the talent pool and know what is going on whilst being very good at what they do. Unfortunately led incorrectly, Mavericks can cause 80% of the problems.

How do I know if I have a Maverick within my organisation?…. The Maverick type is someone that rather than just follow the rules, will actually look at the big picture and say “I don’t understand why you are doing this, it makes no sense”. They are very blunt individuals who will tell you how it is and often question “why” . They are not being challenging at an aggressive stance, they are doing it because they generally want to know and want to help.

Another way to know a Maverick personality is that they will think quite different from other people. They are quite fast thinking and are the ones that will see the next trend that is coming and start moving towards it.

Industries that Mavericks are within….

You will often see a lot of Mavericks in fast moving creative industries such as sales and media. These Mavericks are extrovert type mavericks. Mavericks within technical departments such as engineers and IT are quite often introverted Mavericks.

What are the differences…

• Extroverted Maverick – If you upset an extroverted Maverick, they will give you their opinion and tell you out loud “your wrong, this is the way it should be done, i’m not doing it this way”. You will know when you have upset them.

• Introverted Maverick – These might say “I don’t agree with you” but they will go ahead and do it anyway, you won’t be aware of them. Sometimes people miss that type of Maverick because they are not making a lot of noise so they don’t see them as a problem.

Is it important to find a company with which you are a good fit?…

With Mavericks, sometimes it is going to be impossible to get a real ft and that’s when you have to work round that and say what can they do to achieve in the company? One of the first things that companies can do with Mavericks, because don’t forget there’s not many true Mavericks in a company anyway, is to give them roles that are more consultative because Mavericks have got a very low boredom threshold anyway so when they have fixed the problem, they need to move onto something else.

Mavericks tend to do things when they think there is a compelling reason to do it. They tend to work in companies that are aligned to what they want to achieve.

If a company is going to do true leadership with a team of individuals and get the best results out of them, they will need to make sure that the things they want to implement and how they are going to implement them is finely tuned to the individuals. That is what true management is about.

Is there any difference for black Mavericks in the workplace?…

There are a lot of people who may put black people in the Maverick space when they are not truly Mavericks. This might well be down to stereo tying, and how the black person perceives themselves, and how they act. For example I have been saying that Mavericks tend to challenge a lot, ask why – and it’s for a genuine reason. If a black person does it, rather than actually seeing whether it’s a Maverick type challenge or an aggressive challenge, it might be seen as a aggressive challenge anyway when it’s not.

Lack of confidence….

A lot of Mavericks are motivated internally which means that if they feel like they are doing a good job, they don’t need to be told. An external person needs to be told regularly by people that yes that’s a good job. If someone tells them they can’t do it then they believe them.

Tips for becoming internally motivated..

One of the most basic tips is to understand what you are good at doing and what you are not good at doing because people that are externally influenced in a negative way tend to know their weakness really well but don’t know their strengths.

People should have their strengths on a list and then expand that list so they can say, this is how I use that strength. People might say I’m too trusting, and see that weakness. What does too trusting mean in terms of strength? These people will have a wide circle of friends which can be a major asset. Asking people that you trust, what you are good at and what you are bad at, and what they would change if they were you could also be useful.

You can also have a plan of where you want to be and break it down into steps on how to get there.

If you understand why people do the things they do, you can actually dis-associate yourself from their own behaviours, and that itself will make you stronger.

Confidence in the work place….

Whether it is your own business or in the workplace, no one can argue with true confidence. If you are not self motivated and you really don’t think you are good at what you do despite being told, you may need someone to work with you, as you might not have the skills to bring out your best qualities and this is where a mentor can really help you to gain the competitive edge.

Mavericks are often described by Judith Germain as being wilfully independent, a trait which companies need to utilise if they want to remain competitive and successful. This wilfulness, however, needs to be harnessed because, left unchecked; it can bring down a company with dramatic consequences. Here I advise on the delicate process of balancing the need to encourage a Maverick, whilst restricting their independence to ensure that they can be successful and their employees remain productive, effective and engaged.

When considering some of the true maverick leaders of our time; JFK, Martin Luther King, Richard Branson and Bill Gates, it was their innate sense of leadership and their ability to maintain their vision and belief despite ridicule and criticism that enabled them to succeed where others had failed. In business life, the same challenges occur with many organisations struggling to nurture their ‘mavericks’; people who with the right guidance could probably become the company’s most crucial asset.

Sadly, mavericks tend to be 20 per cent of the most talented employees, causing 80 percent of the company’s problems (also known as Pareto’s 80/20 Rule). Mavericks are naturally impulsive and often don’t think through the consequences of their actions. As a result, organisations often write off mavericks from any kind of talent management programme; deeming them too unpredictable to be considered for promotion. But it is precisely these maverick tendencies which are needed by organisations to survive in the 21^st century and when mavericks see themselves missing out time and time again on promotions and not being recognised for their skill, they can become disruptive and damaging to the organisation.

21^st Century Talent Management

It is clear that the old ways of doing things just aren’t relevant anymore. With more graduates lacking the skills and ability of their predecessors, more mergers, downsizing and de-skilling, combined with more demanding customers, organisations need to be much more flexible and autonomous than ever before if they are to succeed.

Poor performing companies tend to have what I call 20^th Century management thinking, imposing strict command, control and conformity measures on its employees. And the major misinterpretation of European law has results in a one-size fits all approach to management, which lacks the flexibility needed to successfully manage rising talent in an organisation.

Recognising Troublesome Talent

The shortage of highly skilled, talented employees has created a seller’s market, where prime candidates can demand high salaries, ultimate flexibility, but are prepared to give very little in return. They command respect and recognition for their expertise, getting bored quickly when they are not stretched or challenged, resulting in them finding destructive outlets for their talents.

Troublesome Talent are often criticised for their arrogance and negative influence on their peers and often take a defensive or entrenched position. Typically, this situation will lead to higher employee turnover, increased claims of bullying and a drop in team performance.

The first step to regaining the natural balance is to realise that an individualistic approach to managing the team is required. Often, a maverick will need to be treated differently to everyone else and the trick is to find a way of treating them which is specifically tailored for their maverick tendencies, whilst ensuring it remains consistent with the wider employee programme.

Helping harness Maverick Talent

Ironically, mavericks are much more sensitive to being ‘micro-managed’ than other employees, challenging even the simplest of tasks if they think they are being managed rather than led. Often, they refuse to accept instructions that the rest of the team abide by, enjoying their independence and feeling of being in control of their own destiny. As a result they will fight hard to maintain this independence, even if it is likely to go against them in the long run, making it impossible to follow most standard all embracing management approaches.

Mavericks are extremely confident by nature and need to be certain of their success before completing their tasks. This behaviour can manifest itself in a number of ways, most commonly through insisting they have access to the manager whenever they have a query. Mavericks won’t admit they have fears about succeeding and so it is crucial that you give them the time they need to understand the task completely and are confident that it is within their abilities. This does not mean the tasks shouldn’t be challenging as mavericks need to be stretched to stay motivated.

The most important thing to a maverick is recognition and ignoring them is not an option! Failure to recognise their achievements will only result in the engagement of more and more unproductive activities designed to force you to notice them for their ability to cause trouble!

Mavericks like to work to their own timetable and to achieve best performance you should try to find ways to accommodate their creativity, even if it is at odd times of the day! Typically, companies are concerned about the productivity of unsupervised employees, but if you have the respect of your maverick, they will work tirelessly to ensure that your vision is a success.

This will reinforce your trust in the Maverick’s ability to reach peak performance and successful managers are those who have taught the maverick how to gain their trust. Mavericks work well with those they respect and find credible and it is these people who are more likely to enable the maverick to control their behaviour if needed. In fact, managers should enlist the help of anyone they believe has more sway over the maverick than they do!

Keeping control

It is clear that the only way to satisfy the maverick’s specific needs whilst providing the consistency required by the rest of the company is to adopt a leadership style which steers the maverick towards the desired outcome, whilst allowing the maverick to have an agreed, defined amount of autonomy. This will be tricky as mavericks tend to be completely oblivious to the effect that their bluntness has on the morale of others and it can be tempting to revert back to tradition management techniques to bring them back into line – but this must be resisted and replaced with sound, tailored leadership techniques.

Remember, mavericks need boundaries and they will respect you if you enforce them in the right way. Troublesome mavericks need to be given a compelling reason to change their current behaviour and if you manage them correctly, you can unleash their creativity and insight to the benefit of the entire organisation.

One of the overriding problems faced by companies is that they struggle to effectively develop talent. Either preferring a one size fits all management style or employee reward package. In this blog I discuss whether employees should be groomed for management responsibilities.

Despite McKinsey’s War on Talent report 10 years ago – talent management in all its guises are still a strategic priority for many companies across numerous industries even now!

One of the dilemmas facing HR Directors today is whether they should groom employees from the beginning or whether they should allow the employee to feel their own way into management positions. The company’s talent management/succession plan will be decided based on the conclusion they reach. It is not an exaggeration to say that the future of the company can depend on the position that the HR Director takes.

Where do leadership competences come from?

Are leaders born or are they made? Dynamic Transitions believes that leadership skills and techniques can be learnt, transforming a poor manager into a good leader. Great leaders have been exposed to leadership concepts that they practice and demonstrate from early childhood. This early experience enables them to become great leaders in the workplace years later. HR Directors can design their performance reviews and training interventions to nurture or further develop these ‘early learnt’ competencies.

Dynamic Transitions believes that leadership is ‘trusted influence’ that has its basis in the credibility and reputation of the leader. The leader requires the trust and goodwill of his team to function well and that can only be secured if he has integrity and a flexible range of leadership styles which can be effectively implemented.

On the basis that employees remain loyal to individuals not the company it’s imperative that good leadership is demonstrated throughout the organisation. Talent management demands that talent is nurtured so that the company is able to fulfil its objectives and that talent is dispersed throughout the company. Both these concepts require the employee to have a persona that has high reputational value and a character that is ‘trusted’.

Grooming for management responsibilities?

In this changeable climate there is a requirement for workforces to be flexible and companies to be agile to survive. Therefore companies should be encouraging leadership competences in all its employees. The ability to think for themselves, make decisions that are perhaps beyond ‘their pay level’, developing into lateral thinkers with the confidence to challenge the status quo soon becomes a survival imperative. Demonstrating ‘traditional’ leadership competences then becomes the norm within the company with performance reviews and reward systems based, on some level, around leadership.

All employees should be provided with plenty of opportunities to develop leadership competencies in their normal day to day work. Talent Management strategies should groom all employees for management responsibilities, self leadership and self determination can bring depth to job roles and pride in one’s abilities. This is particularly important in environments where flat structures can inhibit upwards movement and economic climate can depress salary increments.

By establishing an environment where (self) leadership development is the norm it is easier and cost effective to identify those with management potential. It has the additional benefit of continuously improving the agility and competence of the company as a whole making it more likely for it to reach growth and financial targets.

Real leaders seem to possess inherent knowledge of people and it is this knowledge demonstrated as social intelligence, reputation (character and intent) and credibility (competence and track record) that can distinguish leaders from managers. Performance reviews and reward structures should be designed to nurture and develop these competencies, thus allowing those with management potential to be easily seen by management (for further development) and enable them to identify themselves as future managers. This is more effective than just following a strategy that requires individuals to feel their own way into management.

How can HR directors spot and develop potential managers without alienating the other members of the workforce?

If the company’s strategy is to nurture talent within its workforce by encouraging all employees to develop self leadership competencies, amongst other task specific skills, employees are less likely to resent the company developing others. This is especially true where reward strategies are transparent and fair to all.

Employees that demonstrate the ability to influence and motivate others, and knowledge of human behaviour to effect better performance, should be identified for potential management. This can be done by one-to-ones with their managers, performance reviews and succession plans.

Development can include coaching, mentoring and bespoke leadership courses designed specifically to fulfil the leadership deficit of the individuals. This should not be at the detriment to more general training interventions for the rest of the workforce.

HR Directors should ensure that all employees are encouraged to develop leadership competencies, thus creating a richer pool of talent, allowing the identification of those that have management potential to be simpler and more effective.

Many organisations risk losing their most talented employees as the credit crunch takes hold, according to leadership company Dynamic Transitions. Speaking at HR Director’s Talent Management Breakfast at the Lord’s Cricket Ground last week, Dynamic Transitions MD Judith Germain warned that the emergence of Generation Y is “spelling further trouble for organisations who continue to adopt a one size fits all approach to talent management”.

Addressing attendees at the exclusive breakfast event on 26^th June, Germain suggested that many of the most talent employees were likely to be selected for redundancy due to their perceived troublesome nature, when in fact, with the right management techniques, these individuals could become the top performers in the organisation.

Germain argued that Troublesome Talent® made up 20% of the top performers in an organisation, but accounted for 80% of the problems and urged attendees not to use redundancies to kick out the business’ best talent.

“The reality is that too many employees prefer to keep their head down and follow rules and procedures that don’t work simply because it is easier and acceptable to do so. Troublesome Talent® however, are prepared to stand up for what they believe in and will tell managers the flaws in the company’s policies and the issues they face. As a result, their employees are often singled out as trouble makers,” said Germain.

Germain revealed that whilst Troublesome Talent® had emerged in Generation X as people started to demand more flexible working and concentration on their individual desires, the emergence of Generation Y (Birth dates between 1980-1994) has meant that organisations need to re-examine their talent management techniques and adopt a more individualistic approach.

“Generation Y employees do not believe in the ‘9-5’ and are more focussed on themselves and their development. They are more likely to question authority and are more entrepreneurial and extrovert than their Generation X predecessors. Organisations need to realise that traditional command and control management techniques just will not work with them,” said Germain.

Germain founded Dynamic Transitions in 2005 and provides strategic mentoring for senior executives and business leaders and delivers innovative leadership programmes, leadership consultancy, training, coaching and mentoring to corporate clients. For more information visit www.developing-leadership.com

I was interviewed by John Farrell from Glastonbury Radio on the topic Mavericks in Business. It airs today at 7pm and will be repeated on Friday and Saturday, again at 7pm. You can listen by going direct to the radio station or by clicking here.

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