Risk & Business Magazine Marcotte Magazine Fall 2017 | Page 13

LEADERSHIP
“Everything in business begins and ends
with leadership.”
BY: VERNE HARNISH
CEO OF GAZELLES,
INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLING AUTHOR
• Inspire a Shared Vision: Develop and
communicate a vivid picture of what
is possible. like GE and thousands of growth firms, but
a few hours spent wisely upfront will save a
leader thousands of hours of drama.
• Challenge the Process: Encourage
continuous improvement and learn
from mistakes. • Enable Others to Act: Foster trust and
collaboration, making it possible for
others to do great work. HIGH STAKES NEGOTIATIONS
Dr. Victoria Medvec, Kellogg School of
Management professor and author of
the online learning program entitled
High Stakes Ne gotiations, helps a leader
maximize success in a complex negotiation
while strengthening the relationship.
•
Encourage the Heart: Recognize
contributions and celebrate values and
victories in a spirit of community.
Again, the key is picking one of the five
practices on which to focus and improve.
HIRING “A” PLAYERS
Brad Smart, author of Topgrading (3rd
Edition 2012), has been teaching top
leaders a hiring and promotion approach
that guarantees 90 percent of your team
will be high performers. And when you’re
surrounded by “A” players, your job of
leading is many times easier.
Dr. Medvec suggests 10 strategies, a few
which include:
•
•
•
Smart’s approach has several unique
components:
• Scorecard: This replaces the standard
job description and outlines cultural
attributes and results.
• Screening Interview: Five specific
questions that accurately determine
whether a candidate should be invited
in for a lengthier interview.
•
CIDS Interview: A multi-hour in-
depth interview that helps discern
patterns of past performance and
behavior.
• TORC: a technique for garnering
useful information from a candidate
prior to calling their references.
• Virtual Bench: A proactive approach
to making sure you have sufficient “A”
player candidates for potential jobs.
It’s an intense process mastered by firms
Name Price/Terms First – puts the
other party in a position of countering
the offer.
Seek Synchronicity – avoid
negotiating and communicating
via email except as a confirmation
tool. Aim for direct conversations
throughout the process.
Fragment Issues – fight the tendency
to simplify the negotiations. Instead,
fragment into as many sub-issues
as possible so you can play with the
variables.
• Generate Multiple Proposals – always
bring multiple options to the table
and vary across the proposals your
strength to bring attention to it.
• Anchor Outcomes – push the edges
with your offers to move the center
closer to your desired outcome. Plus
it allows you to concede some ground
which strengthens the relationship.
Most leaders spend a great deal of time
negotiating with someone they will
eventually have to work with for quite
some time, whether it’s with a customer,
supplier, employee, investor, etc. Learn
how to win while strengthening the
relationship.
PEER COACHING
Marshall Goldsmith, famous business
coach and author of What Got You Here
Won’t Get You There, emphasizes the
necessity of every leader having a peer
coach – someone that can hold a leader
accountable, daily, to the behaviors and
activities that need changed or improved.
He suggests a specific multistep process:
• Gather Feedback – survey colleagues
and gather feedback on areas
of improvement based on the
frameworks above.
• Identify Behaviors – decide on two or
three behaviors that need changed.
• Apologize and Advertise - make
public the behaviors you’re changing
and apologize to those that have
been previously harmed by your bad
behavior.
• Listen and Thank – continue to
garner input and thank those that
provide you constructive feedback.
• Follow-up and Feed-Forward – with
your peer coach report your progress
daily.
In summary, outstanding leaders master
the skills of hiring and negotiations. In
leading others they strive to build a healthy
team atmosphere and enable the five
fundamental practices of leadership. And
to continual improve their capabilities a
leader teams up with a peer coach that
provides daily feedback and
accountability. +
Verne Harnish is founder and CEO of
Gazelles International, a global executive
education and coaching company. Verne
has spent the past 30 years educating
entrepreneurial teams. He’s the author of
Scaling Up that uses approaches honed
from over three decades of advising tens of
thousands of CEOs and executives.
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