Are Your Leadership Biases Muting Growth?

In much of the organizational development work I do, considerable time is spent on identifying and changing the leadership structure. As a result, these changes are to a more empowered team based structure with multi-channel communication. The reason this is so critical to the ongoing growth and profitability of an organization is that leaders at all levels of the company function within their own personal biases.

Consider, for example, that today you likely have leaders who are seeking to advance in their career.  Some of which are looking towards retirement and others are struggling to keep up with the demands of their job. Add to this the fact that each and every leader has individual goals and challenges that may or may not align with those of their peers. When you start to add up these differences it becomes clear that each and every leader, when faced with the same question, may have a very different response.

So what does this mean to growth?

Are your leaders in sales, marketing, customer service and R&D operating from their own biases? Absolutely. What then is ensuring that your customers receive helpful communications, rapid response and a streamlined experience? Likely nothing, especially if these groups are all reporting up into different departments and executives.

It’s the customers experience, satisfaction and demands that should drive organizational decisions and investment, not the biases and preferences of your leaders.

[Tweet “Your customers should drive decisions and investments, not the biases of your leaders.”]

What can you do?

– Find ways to solicit information from your customers directly, without biases or filters.

– Connect with front line employees directly to understand their challenges in serving and supporting your customers.

– Introduce methods that facilitate bottom up communications that surpass leaders and avoid biases

– Encourage collaboration amongst departments without (that’s right!) without leaders present.

Look, we all have our own personal and professional biases. The keys is to ensure any filters do not hinder your ability to better serve, support and enhance your customers experience.

What are you going to do to eliminate your leadership biases?

© Shawn Casemore 2017. All rights reserved.