High Performance Human Capital Leadership
The Allen Austin Way
Real World Solutions for Hiring and Retaining CEOs & Executive Talent in 2009 and Beyond
by ROB ANDREWS & THE PARTNERS OF ALLEN AUSTIN
I would like to dedicate this work to all of the incredible and devoted search professionals who comprise Allen Austin. They are the smartest, most talented group of individuals with whom I have ever had the pleasure to work. I would also like to mention my original mentor in the search profession without whom I never would have had the opportunity to experience the profession which has become my passion, Larry Gladstone.
And as an appeal to boards, CEOs and General Managers that there is nothing more important in business than taking personal responsibility for the attraction, selection, hiring, retaining, coaching, mentoring and developing human capital.
Forward
I wrote this book at the encouragement and in some cases insistence of a number of CEOs, board members and human resource professionals who told me that this material was desperately needed. The book is and will be a work in progress as long as I am active. I add, delete and revise material almost daily in order to provide maximum value.
If you’ve purchased a copy of this book, I am happy to send you a copy with the updates at any time.
In my view, the executive hiring process typically works like dating and marriage, with vey similar results. Just like dating, we usually start out with a woefully inadequate description of precisely who we are, exactly what we are looking for and what we are trying to accomplish.
Because we usually rely on simple job descriptions and resumes, and don’t typically define all of the critical success factors in advance, as well as our specific performance objectives; and because we don’t fast forward the tape and look in to the future, the selection process becomes a beauty pageant and a chemistry contest. We hire a new executive because it feels right; he or she looks good, sounds good, smells good, and is oh so charming. Then, in three to six months, we start to have that queasy feeling in our gut that suggests we might have made a mistake and that things are just not working out. Roughly 50% of the time, within a year, we know we’ve made a mistake.
For better than thirty years, I have studied what is currently being called human capital leadership. Buzz words, trends and pop expressions come and go. What I am really talking about in this piece is getting things done with and through people: attracting, screening, selecting, hiring, leading, managing, encouraging, disciplining, organizing and retaining People.
It has been said that it takes 10,000 hours of study to become and expert in any subject. If that is true, I suppose thirty-five years of study makes me an expert although I don’t particularly like the term. Especially since I’ve also heard that an Ex is a has-been and a Spurt is a drip under pressure.
The expert debate notwithstanding, I think you will get a great deal of real value out of this material. I have read hundreds of books on these subjects. I subscribe to all of the latest and greatest thought resources including the Harvard Business Review. I’ve also had the privilege of knowing and working with some unbelievably effective leaders and managers.
While I am an admitted contrarian on a number of issues, I believe the advice outlined in this material is extremely sound. I also know that the “business as usual” model does not work. My intent is to separate the wheat from the chaff, using as few words as possible, and without all of excerpts from articles and studies that have been saying the same thing for years, in order to present you with material that will help you with your real world human capital leadership endeavors.
I would also like to make it very clear that I am critical of how the hiring process works in general terms. It is not my intention to say disparaging things about any firm in particular or my profession in general. My hope is that you will read these words and examine your own human capital practices.
Where My Journey Started
I become interested in business and leadership at a very young age for reasons that remain unclear. Somewhere in my hardwiring, there resided an intense curiosity about the way organizations are staffed and lead. My first job was in a convenience store where I outlasted five different store managers and had an opportunity to observe how not to manage a business enterprise. My second job was in a small independent grocery store where I survived three management changes and yet more examples of what did and did not work.
In July of 1970 I turned sixteen and was old enough to go to work legally. Having four years of fulltime food retailing experience, I went to work for Safeway Stores, Inc. in one of Houston’s earliest Safeway stores. By July of 1972, I had performed just about every job available in a food store and was promoted to Management Trainee. In 1974 I became an Assistant Store Manager and was promoted to Store Manager in 1975.
During the nine years I spent with Safeway, I received an absolutely spectacular education on what leadership is and is not. I also learned about management; what good management looked like and non-existent management looked like. I saw outstanding leadership combined with pretty good management produce great results. I saw tight management with mediocre leadership produce lousy results. And then I had the distinct pleasure of seeing the spectacular results stemming from good management and outstanding leadership.
In 1978 I got my first real exposure to what happens in a substantial organization when you replace a great leader with a micromanager with lousy leadership skills. February of 1978 saw my hero, a great leader named Don Gates, who had led our division as Retail Operations Manager since its inception, promoted to Division Manager in Butte, Montana.
Don Gates was a fiery and passionate retailing executive who epitomized high performance leadership. He was a high school graduate who often talked about spending ten years as a produce department manger. Don was hardly the typical executive you would see described in a modern day search spec and yet he had every attribute necessary in order to be an exemplary leader. When Don left our division to take over the reins in Butte, a thirty-nine store division regarded by many as a starter division, he made dramatic improvements in store performance and made money for the first time in many years. He left the Butte division to take over the Kansas City division where he repeated his stellar performance. Don’s next stop was the Southern California division, the largest division in the company, where he set records for same-store sales and profits as well as overall Return on Investment performance. He was then asked to lead the Eastern Division, headquartered in Landover, Maryland and ultimately retired as Division President in Phoenix.
I make it a point to stop and talk about Don Gates for a number of reasons. First of all, leadership is not limited to, or just about degrees, years of experience, job titles, intelligence, pedigree, or technical expertise.
High performance leaders lead consistently in a manner that inspires others to trust and follow them. They know how to connect with the workforce in such a manner that everyone in the organization understands the mission at hand. They are involved in all of the critical areas of the business: strategy, people systems and operations. They are not micromanagers by any means, but they are fully aware of what’s going on in their business. They understand what drives the business. High performance leaders encourage their leadership teams to stretch and achieve while holding everyone accountable for their performance, behavior and promises. High performance leaders, unlike managers help their organization cope with ambiguity by crystallizing the end objective, painting the vision, assigning priorities, separating the wheat from the chaff and providing a laser like focus. High performance leaders do not know it all. They know what they don’t know. They understand their own strengths, weaknesses and propensities; and they delegate and compensate accordingly. High performance leaders share information, resources and credit effectively. They understand there is no limit to what can be accomplished if they don’t care who gets the credit. High performance leaders are real people. They are not afraid to show vulnerability, admit mistakes and ask for help. They are constantly communicating their company’s vision, purpose and values. These high performance leaders are constantly mindful of customers, end users and their rank-in-file employees. High performance leaders are decisive, yet not reckless. They understand that a good plan well executed beats an ironclad plan with mediocre execution every time. These people understand that all employees deep down want to do a good job and want to feel like they are making a contribution. They understand that we are all looking for leadership. High performance leaders are confident, yet not arrogant. They are in constant contact with their organization to the extent they can feel the pulse; their constituents feel a connection with them. High performance leaders have a sense of humor and the ability to make the job fun. They understand the power of a workforce that is happy to see them, not afraid of them. These individuals are high integrity players. They mean and do what they say; they have no hidden agendas. Most high performance leaders are story tellers. They teach by telling stories and using anecdotes and metaphors to illustrate their points and put things in perspective. These people instill passion in others and energize their workforces. They treat everyone with dignity and respect and do not tolerate abuse of others.
Don Gates exemplified all of these traits and I will always be grateful for his example. He was enormously impactful for many aspiring young leaders, such as myself. I will always be grateful for the exposure to such a powerful High Performance Leader so early in my career. He helped me set a leadership standard that has been very helpful in assessing the effectiveness of my own leadership, as well as that of others.