Coaching Senior
Leadership Teams (SLT)

Through Formation and/or into Functionality

Herb Stevenson
March 31, 2014

On the surface, you wouldn't think that assembling a functional senior leadership team would pose a significant problem to the typical CEO. After all, senior leaders are an organization's best and brightest. They've progressed through the ranks, demonstrated their abilities, and proven that they get along well with their colleagues and the people who work for them. So why are so many senior leadership teams unproductive and possibly counter-productive?

As coaches, we are being asked to formally assist in the formation and/or to facilitate through extremely difficult tensions amongst senior leadership team members. Over the course of the last several year, it has become clear that many SLTs are dysfunctional at best. Some of the difficulty is related to the lack of awareness of how to work with peers, where authority and positional power are equal and interdependency is a fact of success.

As SLTs are formed, it is surprising how many have never taken the time to define and negotiate a basic charter surrounding authority, responsibility, commitment, and communication. In short, a set of defining boundaries. At a minimum, the CEO, if forming the team, needs to establish a clear purpose for the team; otherwise, it will fragment and be unproductive.

Coaching the CEO

As the CEO decides to form or reformulate the SLT, there should be some coaching on the following:

• "Many chief executives make the mistake of assuming that if the team members know the organization's mission statement, then they understand the team's purpose."
  The CEO must have a clear vision for the SLT, and must articulate his or her perspective to others. Otherwise, we have multiple opinions about what is the business of the team and how it should function. It is surprising how many times each member of the SLT has a history of experiences from prior teams, none of which apply to the present SLT.

• In a global economy and the "constant white water" of day-to-day work life, it is imperative that the CEO be sensitive to, and empathetic toward, the anxiety that results from continual change. This will show up in the frustration of team members either as abrasiveness or being checked out. Grounding the team at each meeting and staying focused on the work at hand will support their effectiveness

• The CEO must be willing to share power in order to gain power, rather than hoarding it. If the SLT is to be functional, a balance between the authority of the CEO to make appropriate decisions and the necessary unabashed dialogue that is needed from the SLT to make quick and effective decisions is imperative. Defining and negotiating these dynamics will pay massive dividends.

• "Clarifying the team boundaries often involves some pain and some difficult conversations about who is and is not on the team."

  In that same vein, the CEO, especially new leaders will need to chose colleagues whose skills complement, rather than resemble, their own. Often the titles decide who becomes members of the SLT; thereby, ensuring that the meetings are more show and tell than decisive. In today's environment, a base team with key contributors floating in and out is one effective method.

Coaching Guidance for Measuring Success

CEOs and SLTs find measuring their own effectiveness nearly impossible. Instead, stockholders, customers and employees are in a much better position to evaluate them, since the teams' performance directly affects these constituencies. Nonetheless, the trap can become that so long as all stakeholders are happy, then the CEO and SLT must be effective.

One thing you can coach the CEO how to determine the effectiveness by how well the team members interact and set the stage for future collaboration. Bickering and petty disagreements do not foster productive long-term relationships, but robust discussion does. The team experience should develop the top leaders'; therefore it is the responsibility of the CEO to see the SLT as an opportunity for executive development. At a minimum, the SLT should learn new capabilities, increase their knowledge and gain insight into interpersonal relationships. For example the coach could have the CEO take these three "essential steps" to assemble the team:

1. Assemble a team whose members can work collaboratively on enterprise issues and who will respect the rules of engagement the CEO defines and negotiates. Where needed, training can be provided in how to create effective collaboration and dialogue.

2. Establish the team's direction in line with corporate goals. Though frustrating for some SLTs, the rewards are immense when alignment is clearly developed and shared versus the individual perceptions that "we already know" when they don't.

3. Choose team members based on enterprise perspective and collaborative ability rather than title.

Pitfalls

During the define and negotiate process with the team, there should be some formal mechanism to support the following three processes:

1. Create a structure that enables team members to focus on strategic initiatives rather than small tactical issues. Pettiness can riddle the best SLT when it is dragged down into the weeds. An assignment to the appropriate SLT member should be for any tactical issues; otherwise, the SLT will get lost in their own pettiness.

2. "White water", the state of constant turbulence, ensures that team members feel short on time and resources. The CEO should ensure that the SLT has sufficient time for robust debate and have access to the resources they need to do their work. If not, the meeting will focus on those two issues, time and resources, instead of the strategic initiatives.

3. The coach will need to constantly maintain a vigilance for using the meetings for executive development. The CEO (or coach initially) should provide direct interventions into the team process to help members learn better team strategies over time. Coaching for Success

Improving the performance of a senior leadership team can be challenging, yet extremely gratifying. Some teams find that they cannot address their problems without the assistance of a coach. A good coach – whether it's the CEO, a team leader, a team member or an outsider – helps team members recognize behaviors that enhance or hinder teamwork. The coach ensures that team members stay on task, avoid inflammatory language during discussions and respect boundaries.

In fact, coaching can improve even the most self-sufficient team. Almost every team develops a self-correcting capability, and sometimes team members emerge as the most qualified leaders. The wise CEO (and coach) nurtures and takes advantage of the situation by developing their talent.

Coaching is especially helpful throughout the developmental process. At each point, the team needs a different kind of coaching:

• Beginning – During the start-up, there will be a period of forming and storming as everyone tries to get a sense of how the team dynamics will evolve. The coach or CEO needs to articulate the team's purpose; establish a team identity – a sense of "us"; and agree on "norms and expectations." When teams go wrong, the problem is often that they never established their purpose and identity at the onset.

• Middle – As the team settles, it will begin to normalize itself. The team members have some experience working together. The time is right for the CEO or coach to stop for a moment to ask, "How is it going?" and to change behaviors and structures that aren't working. If things are really going astray, the team leader may need to refocus the group strongly and openly. Bad behavior of any sort fits into this category.

• End – As the team performs over time, it is a good to review projects or fiscal period to look back on its successes and failures. To be able to witness itself is a form of action learning that will ensure continued development.

Regardless of who coaches the team, the SLT should feel a sense of adventure and excitement when the team first forms. If they're merely going through the motions, they will not produce the cutting-edge thinking that a group of senior leaders ought to provide. CEOs are responsible for instilling a sense of commitment to the team purpose.

Resources:

Leadership Team Coaching: Developing Collective Transformational Leadership by Peter Hawkins, 2011. Kogan-Page.

Senior Leadership Teams: What it takes to make them great by Ruth Wageman, Debra A. Nunes, James A. Burruss, J. Richard Hackman 2008 Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation.

The New Global Leaders: Richard Branson, Percy Barnevik, David Simon And the Remaking of International Business by Manfred F.R.Kets de Vries with Elizabeth Florent-Treacy, 1999. Jossey-Bass.

 

---

To Top