It’s not controversial to say that the front line matters.
Market researchers consistently agree that companies areincreasing their investment in developing front-line leaders, i.e., those whodirectly manage line employees. According to Bersin, companies tripledinvestment from 2009 to 2012. (See References at the end of this article.) Accordingto Training Magazine, “Management/SupervisoryTraining” led the pack for how many companies plan to increase investment outof ten content areas they track.
And research shows that improving the performance of front-lineleaders really does make a difference. According to the Leadership DevelopmentRoundtable of the Corporate Executive Board, “Shifting an effective manager toan effective people manager can improve employee performance by 25%, employeeengagement by 29% and employee retention by 40%.”
At Kineo, we’ve been spending time recently talking withcompanies about how they develop front-line leaders. Many are telling us thatthey wish they had a better way. In particular, they seem concerned abouttransfer. How can they ensure that front-line leaders actually apply what theylearn in training back to their jobs?
Everyone hopesthey can get better at training their managers. But as renowned Army General Gordon R. Sullivanonce said, “Hope is not a method.” Perhaps we should adopt this moreaction-oriented version of it from General Carl Vuono: “Don’t tellme what you hope will happen, don’t tell me what you wish you could do. Give mea plan that makes it happen.”
When it comes to ensuring that front-line leaders actuallyapply on the job the skills we address in training, does your company “have aplan that makes it happen”?
Hope is not a method
When we create a training program for any group, front-lineleaders included, it’s all too easy to put all of our focus on the learningintervention itself and not pay enough attention to the larger context it willbe used in. After all, we can readily control the intervention. But gettingother people to do their parts feels less in our control. How can we in L&Dimpact what happens on the job? Isn’t that something that the business mustdrive?
The result can often be characterized as, “We put peoplethrough great training … and then hope they put it to use.”
Research from Forum shows the flaw in that approach. AsForum reports, “[Our] data support Robert Brinkerhoff’s 40/20/40 rule: Aligning and Sustaining make a much greaterimpact on learning than does simply Equipping learners with the skills to makea change.”
A source of inspiration
When thinking through a hard problem, it can help to borrowideas from how someone else has solved a similar problem.
Over the past few years, I’ve become impressed with howoften physical therapy (PT) just works. I noticed when I went through PT, that myexperience differed in some important ways from a typical front-line leaderdevelopment program. Here are the key differences I saw … and the questionsthey raised for me about how we design front-line leader programs to “bake in”transfer.
1. PhysicalTherapy is something you *do*
I went to PT to loosen up a frozen rotator cuff. Across mysix weeks of sessions, at 50 minutes each week, I spent a total of perhaps threeminutes learning about shoulder anatomy (i.e., maybe 1% of my time learningabout concepts and models).
I spent the vast majority of my time learning drills that Iwas to perform later at home. In short, my experience was mostly organizedaround preparing me, in a very nuts and bolts way, to practice back home.
How much time does your front-line leader developmentprogram allocate to educating front-line leaders “about” leadership concepts.Should we instead keep a laser focus on what front-line leaders should practiceback on the job? What are the four steps to take when coaching a team member?What are the three questions to ask before you try to get a disaffectedemployee re-engaged?
2.Results are visible … week by week
I landed in therapy because my shoulder gradually tightenedup. I had tweaked it months before, so I thought I should lay off of it.Looking back, week-by-week, I could move it less and less … but this changed sogradually I never noticed. Then, one day, I needed someone to help me put on mycoat and thought, “Huh, that’s just not right!”
Once in PT, it suddenly became crystal clear where I stood.My therapist had a simple angle measure that showed just how flexible myshoulder was. Every week, we started with the measure. So, every week, we couldsee how I was doing. Something that had been invisible to me was now clear.
In your company’s front-line leader development program, do front-lineleaders get a clear view of their capabilities? Do they get a clear view of howtheir capabilities grow as they workon them? Should we provide skills assessments that give front-line leaders aclear view based on their demonstratedperformance? In fact, should we move these to the front-and-center, just aseach week, my PT session started with taking my measure?
3. The realwork happens back home
From the moment I walked into PT, the clearly statedassumption was that if I was going to get better, it was because I convincedmyself to do some uncomfortable work several times each day back home. Myweekly PT session would give me the right homework. So, each week, mytherapist, the woman I called my “Mistress of Misery,” would first review myprogress and then give me a new routine based on where I had reached.
In your company’s front-line leader development program, isthe presumption that the actual development happens on the job? Or is it that “Well,they went to training so now they must be trained! Great, let’s get back towork.” Should we reposition our programs so that all involved think of “training” only as laying the groundwork forthe important work … back on the job?
4. The homeworkis simple and bite-sized
Each PT session, the therapist gave me homework. “Spend 10minutes three times a day to do each of these five exercises. Ten reps for eachexercise.” The homework was never dauntingand never very time-consuming.
Some front-line leader programs are designed around thenotion we can only get access to front-line leaders for one chunk of a fewdays. So, we use those days to dump as much as we can on them. When we insertaction learning, it’s often in the form of dauntingly large action projects.Should we instead use our initial time with front-line leaders to cover fewerthings more deeply with the idea that we willthen feed bite-sized development activities to participants step-by-step overtime?
5. I hadindividual attention from a therapist over a span of time
As I went through PT, Ischeduled time with my therapist. Each week, we had fifty minutes in which wefocused just on where I was and what I needed to do next.
Too often, front-line leader programs do not provideindividualized attention. Who plays the “therapist” role for a new front-line leader?Most companies promote the philosophy that a front-line leader’s development isthe joint responsibility of the front-line leader and her manager. But we hearfrom many companies that they worry that the managers-of-front-line leadersneither take sufficient time to develop their front-line leaders nor have theskills to do so effectively. Should we figure out how to create “developmentjourneys” that routinely incorporate managers-of-front-line leaders into their front-lineleaders development over a span of time?
6. The therapisthad a toolkit
When I was in PT, doing the “homework”was, mechanically, what caused my recovery. How hard was it for my “Mistress ofMisery” to assign it? Not very. Each week after measuring my progress, shewould go to a computer and print out a series of drawings that had all thepolish of line drawings from a 1950s army manual. Maybe not glitzy, but itworked. The therapist did not need to invent new approaches for me or thinkhard about how to help me. Based on my progress, she identified the nextexercises in what I imagine was a predefined path, printed them, and thencoached me in how to actually do them.
In short, each week, my therapist did three basic things: 1.Measure progress (using a simple tool); 2. Identify homework; and 3. Coach mehow to do that homework.
As far as I was concerned, these interactions represented my“moment of truth” with my PT. Too often, when front-line leader programs ask managers-of-front-line-leadersto coach and guide their front-line leaders, they do not clearly lay out whatmoments of truth are expected nor give those managers the tools they need.Should we provide managers-of-front-line-leaders the equivalent of the toolkitmy therapist had?
The bottom line
Would it make a difference to move to a model for front-lineleader development like the model used by my physical therapist for physicalimprovement? The data seems to say “Yes!” According to the Conference Board, “Organizationsthat report their leaders practice and then receive feedback on key skills withtheir managers are five times more likely to have high leader quality.”
Will it play in Peoria?
The differences I’ve noted above between how PT works and howmany companies develop their front-line leaders seem intriguing and meaningful.But that doesn’t mean that making a shift is easy.
Clearly, the PT model revolves around the therapist. Thatis, around a highly trained professional who is dedicated to doing this work.Who is not plagued by other responsibilities. Oh, and who gets paid for it.
Is it realistic to think that companies can adopt theseideas for front-line leader development? Typically managers-of-front-line-leadersare not highly trained on how to create behavior change. They face abewildering variety of competing demands on their time. And their annualreviews usually do not weigh heavily on their success at developing their front-lineleaders.
Hmmm. Maybe it will not be so easy. But maybe also we canchange that equation.
I spoke to one manager of leadership development who ran a front-lineleader program that worked more-or-less like my PT experience. His leadershipdevelopment team provided classes that exposed front-line leaders to how toperform key tasks. Those classes were seen only as an introduction. Then, front-lineleaders worked with their managers over the next year to practice, using astheir tools rubrics and brief guides provided by the leadership developmentteam. Worked great! Why? The CEO bought into it.
Now, what CEO wouldn’twant to better develop their front-line leaders? That is, if the CEO couldactually see the results … and not just hope that results would come.Similarly, what business leader wouldn’t want such results?
Maybe we need to add an extra element to the mix if we wantto organize front-line leader development to use the PT model. Should we givebusiness leaders a way to see the impact they are making and hold each otheraccountable for doing the work? While evaluation is always important, should weprovide a clear scorecard that shows results across levels and across businessunits?
What is your “plan that makes it happen”?
Do you believe that your front-line leaders would developfaster if your company could give them the kind of attention that I received inPT? Do you believe that the hill is worth the climb, and that it’s worthinvesting to drive that kind of attention? If so, how might you make progress?Which of the six ideas mentioned here would you choose to work on?
References
O’Leonard, Karen, and Kim Lamoureux. Leadership Development Factbook 2009: Benchmarks and Analysis ofLeadership Development Spending, Staffing, and Programs. Bersin &Associates, 2009.
O’Leonard, Karen, and Laci (Barb) Loew. Leadership Development Factbook 2012: Benchmarks and Trends in U.S.Leadership Development. Bersin & Associates, 2012.
Training Magazine. “2014 Training Industry Report.” Oct/Nov 2014.(https://www.trainingmag.com/trgmag-article/2014-training-industry-report)
CEB HR Leadership Council for Mid-Sized Companies. “EnablingManagers to Drive Employee Development: Creating a Performance-FocusedOrganization.” 2011.
The ForumCorporation. “The Behavior Change Handbook.” 2012.
