It is essential that every company be leaner and meaner in the current business climate. As a result, executives are paying more attention to the type of employee they hire and fire. Every person who comes in contact with customers, from the receptionist, to the customer service and sales representative must share the company’s goals and possess the skills required to do an excellent job.
As companies and businesses continue to change, companies find themselves with good employees that no longer are in the right job. The employee themselves are not individuals whose performance has suddenly slipped but the requirements and skills necessary to perform has gradually shifted in the merger, acquisition, restructuring or with the new corporate focus and direction. These unfortunate people often find themselves in a job that no longer fits them, and their managers often find themselves with a people resource dilemma.
In his book, Good to Great-Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t, author Jim Collins refers to this concept as “making sure you have the right people on your bus and determining whether they are in the right seats.” Published in 2001, Collins’s book discusses the ways good organizations can be turned into ones that produce great, sustained results. The bus analogy requires executives to evaluate every one of their employees frequently—to look at their skills and job requirements, and determine whether there is a gap and how it can be filled. Then corporate leadership needs to mentor their top performers, weed out the bottom, and grow and develop those in the middle. Making these decisions, especially the ones concerning firing people, are often difficult. Most senior executives feel so much loyalty to their staff they are often unwilling to admit their skills are not keeping pace with the current business requirements. But Collins says that no matter how big or small a company is, it can only afford to have the best people possible driving its goals. Otherwise its business objectives will not be achieved.
For each of us, it is critical to make certain our bus is going in the right direction, with the right people on it and that they are sitting in the right seats!
Leadership Coaching Newsletter is written and produced by Wendy Capland. If you have any questions or comments, please send them to: wcapland@visionquestconsulting.com. We'd love to hear from you.
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