Your questions answered, Inside Track, January 2010
How do I handle the difficult situation of telling an executive team colleague that he is simply not delivering what we need from him or his function, yet I want to help him be successful in his leadership role?
A tricky one. Firstly, banish the idea of ‘telling’ him what you think – you have to find a way to help him see for himself what is going on and what contribution he needs to make. How can you do that?
One approach is to suggest a new discussion item at your exec team meetings – a round up of what you are each preoccupied with as the current concerns or major risks to the delivery of your current strategy or change plan. A discussion of the potential derailers will give you (and him) the opportunity to air concerns about things that need to be actioned or prioritised. In addition, I also urge you to have a one-to-one conversation with him as soon as possible as a professional and clearly caring colleague.
There may well be other things going on that you are not aware of and he will welcome that empathetic approach. In a one-to-one you can set out clearly what you see as the expectations everyone has of him, help him be aware of the signals, that he may or may not be picking up, that he is not up to the job and work out together what he should do about it.
Make sure you keep focused on his personal leadership role, not what is happening in his area, as the conversation will otherwise deflect to what his team should be doing differently, when your aim is how you can help him be successful.
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