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Performance Pointers Archives Is 'leadership' really a critical factor for corporate success? According to the authors of ‘Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-truths, and Total Nonsense’, Pfeffer and Sutton, leadership doesn’t have all that great a positive influence. Bad leaders can have a huge influence, though. But the difference between absolutely great companies and the mediocre ones is, so the evidence shows, at most attributable for a measly 10% to the quality of the leader(s). That leadership is all-important is one of the ‘dangerous half-truths’ that they discuss in their book. It’s true sometimes, particularly if the leader is a bad one (think Stalin, Hitler) but not really true otherwise. And the evidence also points to business process as the critical component of success - not so sexy, perhaps, but think about it: mediocre performers can do very well with excellent processes, while even the most stellar and gifted people cannot perform well when forced to follow ineffective or dysfunctional processes. Replace a poor performer, and 9 times out of 10 the new person does not much better, because s/he is applying the same processes - which are muddled, convoluted, unwieldy, or bureaucratic. Or all of the former. Most organizations are however extremely reluctant to tinker with their business processes, for fear of losing control. In unionized environments, even the staff (who complain bitterly about the ‘stupid’ processes) are lukewarm to the idea, because inefficient processes mean you need more people to get the job done. Fixing the processes often means triggering redundancies. But I am convinced that good process is where it’s at. Fix the processes, and THEN hire good people. Last updated on Oct 15, 2010 at 07:30 AM
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