Developing effective leadership within your organization

Why is effective leadership unique to each organization?

The concept of leadership effectiveness is not fixed, it depends on the organizational context. Therefore, a leader’s effectiveness is not measured solely by their skills in absolute terms but by how these skills align with the specific context of their company.

How to define effective leadership across your organization?

This article aims to answer this question by exploring what a benchmark is, how to build one, and how to use it to assess and develop effective leadership within your organization.

What is a leadership benchmark?

A leadership benchmark is a framework that allows you to define, measure, and compare the behavioral competencies needed to succeed within your organization.

It can be a generic benchmark based on existing and reliable industry data, or it can be personalized to meet your specific needs, enabling you to set your own standards. It defines the behavioral skills individuals should develop to succeed within their organization. This framework allows for a more relevant and aligned assessment of leaders, based on the needs and organizational context of the company.

How to create a custom leadership benchmark?

Creating a tailored leadership benchmark requires a methodical and balanced approach that combines both individual feedback (bottom-up) and strategic needs (top-down).

Bottom-up: Analyzing high-performing leaders

This first step involves identifying and gathering behavioral data from individuals you consider to be effective leaders within your organization and using them as references. It’s important to keep in mind that one does not need to hold a managerial position to be a leader. As Dr. Carolyn Hass points out, leadership is not defined by the title, but by an individual’s impact and their alignment with the competencies valued by its organization.

Once the data is collected, you must analyze it to identify patterns and competencies that stand out among these top-performing leaders. What common traits and behaviors distinguish these effective leaders? For example, in company A, the ability to communicate effectively, maintain high energy levels, and thrive in chaos are common among top performers.

Top-down: defining your needs and expectations

In this second step, the organization must define, based on its context, vision, aspirational culture, and goals, the competencies it deems necessary and what it expects from its leaders. What do you want your leaders to further develop to succeed in the long term? These expectations should be clearly identified and defined so they can be included in the benchmark.

Let’s continue with company A’s example. Since it operates in an ultra-competitive and rapidly changing environment, the company expects its leaders to be resilient in the face of adversity and to make bold decisions to stand out from the competition.

Merging the two approaches

Creating an effective benchmark requires merging these two approaches by combining the current reality of the organization with its ambitions. This results in a relevant, tailored model that can serve as a tool for measuring and developing a powerful talent strategy.

The steps outlined above have been simplified for the sake of clarity, but establishing a benchmark requires a deep analysis of the organization and its people. SuccessFinder is an ideal tool for creating a custom benchmark: based on 26 competencies and 85 underlying traits, its psychometric assessment provides the most precise and nuanced behavioral data available on the market. Our dedicated behavioral scientists work closely with you to analyze and integrate this data with your strategic objectives to create a reliable, company-specific benchmark.

Applications of the leadership benchmark for leadership development

Once created, the leadership benchmark can be used in several strategic areas of the organization:

1- Talent selection

The benchmark becomes a standard for assessing and selecting potential leaders by comparing them to your model. This allows you to identify individuals whose behaviors most closely align with the desired behavioral skills the company is looking for. It then becomes easier to predict success and growth within your company.

2- Internal mobility and career management

The benchmark can be used to ensure that internal talents are aligned with leadership roles that suit them as the organization evolves. Internal talent assessments help identify high-potential employees and those with behavioral preferences aligned with leadership positions, offering them development and advancement opportunities that are consistent with their potential.

3- Leadership development programs

The benchmark helps measure the gap between current competencies within the organization and those that are critical for effective leadership. Once the competencies to be developed are clearly identified, it becomes possible to create tailored, targeted development programs that address the individual needs of your leaders.

4- Strategic succession plans

The benchmark plays a crucial role in creating a leadership pipeline. It helps identify talents who are ready to step into leadership positions, ensuring long-term strategic leadership continuity.

Benefits of a custom leadership model

Specific framework for your unique initiatives

Adopting a custom benchmark prevents you from applying criteria that are not suited to your context. Your leaders will be more aligned with your organization, sharing its values and meeting its expectations.

Strengthening organizational culture by aligning leaders with your values

Leaders have a direct influence on organizational culture. Using the benchmark as a guide ensures that they reflect the organization’s core values, thereby reinforcing a strong and cohesive culture.

Improving employee engagement and talent retention through targeted leadership

Leadership that meets the needs of employees creates a motivating work environment that fosters engagement. This has a direct impact on talent retention, reducing turnover and promoting individual autonomy.

Conclusion

Leadership effectiveness is not a one-size-fits-all concept, it must align with an organizational context. Creating a custom benchmark, based on a deep understanding of your talents, values, goals, and needs should not be underestimated.

To create your benchmark, it is essential to invest in science-backed data collection tools and methodologies so that your model can effectively guide your ability to select, assess, develop, and support leaders in a relevant way.

SuccessFinder helps you create your custom benchmark using reliable tools and methodologies to collect and analyze behavioral data. Our behavioral science experts collaborate with you to design a leadership model that meets the specific needs of your organization. Let’s talk if you want to learn more.