Organizational Issues That Prevent Effective Leadership

There are several problems that organizations face with a typical/average manager based on research published in the Harvard Business Review.  It turns out that many “leaders” are actually not able to perform a leadership function effectively.  It is a real obstacle for companies if someone who is supposed to be an “organizational leader” turns out to be someone who is unable to communicate with their direct reports or spend time with them or set clear goals and directions or give feedback.  If the data below is true then that is a very high cost for any organization and this issue negatively impacts any organization’s ability to operate effectively.

Let’s look at the issue from both sides/perspectives – what did employees state when they were surveyed and what did managers anonymously state when they were also surveyed?  Based on this information, every organization should consider if it has such “leaders” on their team and what they can do to remedy/fix the issues that are not obvious but which are certainly costing productivity and performance to the company.  There is no easy answer here but it’s a question that a truly effective CEO or GM of any organization should be asking.  And if you are an effective VP (i.e. VP of Sales or any other group) then you should also assess the leadership capabilities of your Directors of managers who are supposed to lead their teams (and then decide how to help develop them and improve their skills, if applicable/necessary).

 

Problem Highlight #1

According to this research published by Harvard Business Review, employees complain that organizational leaders and managers do not provide clear direction, nor meet enough with their employees.

 

 

Source: https://hbr.org/2015/06/the-top-complaints-from-employees-about-their-leaders

 

 

Problem Highlight #2

And according to the data below also published by Harvard Business Review, managers anonymously admit that on average they are “uncomfortable” communicating with their employees or giving feedback.

Source: https://hbr.org/2016/03/two-thirds-of-managers-are-uncomfortable-communicating-with-employees

 

 

What else?  What are some thoughts on how CEOs and organizational leaders should battle this problem or how they should hire or develop leaders that don’t face these issues and can communicate effectively with their teams?