One of the most important decisions that any organisation needs to make is in appointing leaders. Whether it is a large company appointing a CEO, a church calling a Minister, a charity appointing Trustees, in fact any group putting someone in a leadership role over others, there are many issues to consider.
Bill Hybels, senior pastor of Willowcreek Church in Chicago uses the 3 ‘C’s – character, competence and chemistry. He now sees the most important as chemistry – will the individual fit into the team without upsetting the balance too much. Obviously, you want to appoint someone of character, lest it come back to haunt you at some stage. However, the issue that I want to consider in this short blog is the ‘Competence of a Leader’.
It needs to be clear what a leader will be expected to do. This could be in the form of a job description or other similar document to enable you to measure any potential candidates against. You may consider the track record that the candidates may have in other organisations. You may headhunt a certain individual from another organisation. But whatever you do, you must ensure that the leader is competent to get, at least, the basics of the role right.
Added to that, however, you need to test the competence of a potential leader in the situation of the unknown. There will always be difficult situations that will arise at times, that you cannot pre-empt, and that you cannot prepare for. These can define your organisation by the way in which it – through its leaders – faces it and deals with it. You must seek to test a leaders competence in dealing with such situations as far as possible.
A few situations come to mind:
There is the football captain, a well-known famous individual who has led club and country on many occasions. There have been embarrassing situations relating to his personal life in the past but despite that he has remained as your club’s leader. Then the shock comes – questions about words that he said “in the heat of battle” bring a huge racist row, which rumbles on for many months. As a leader, he should not be plastered across front pages of newspapers because of his private life, and should certainly be above shouting extreme unpleasantries whatever is happening in the game. He is the leader, a role model – don’t you question his competence?
Recently, that great national institution, the BBC has been reeling from the allegations of abuse made against its star of years ago, Jimmy Saville. Daily, questions are raised over who knew what? and why didn’t they say anything at the time? as the allegations grow and grow. A newly appointed leader of the organisation looks totally out of his depth. Another investigative report into abuse is aired bringing more controversy and he has to admit he knew nothing about it – surely in the existing climate he wants to know anything going on in the organisation relating to any kind of abuse? Surely he wants to be consulted before it is broadcast? You have to question his competence to be given this role – and that of the Trustees in putting him in a role that he appears to be completely unsuited to.
I’ve seen many cases – the Bank Manager that cannot deal effectively with staff, the Headteacher who cannot lead the school properly, the church leadership team who struggle to deal with that unexpected problem, the charity run by people with a passion for a cause but who don’t know how to ensure proper governance is in place.
Please, when appointing somebody to a leadership role, ensure that they are competent. At the very minimum they must be competent in the basics of their role, but they also need to know how to deal with the unexpected, the difficult issues, the awkward conversation in an effective way. People in your organisation are looking for them to step up and lead them through the situation and out the other end.
Competence is essential in a leader – yet we so often don’t test for it!! Let’s ensure that we get it right from now on.