Bench Strength

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AKING

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ORRECTIONS

7. Review changes to accounta bilit ies for majo r program ac -

tivities. If yo ur change in strategy will require the formatio n

of your co mpany ’s fir st lea dership talent pool, who will di-

rect this activ ity? I f you are the CTO, h ow wil l your chart er

and leadership role change under the new stra tegy?

8. Review th e metrics and measures o n whic h the new str at-

egy will be eval uated .

9. Finally, reach agreement with your team on what wil l need

to b e comm unica ted to your e xecut ives and oth er organiza -

tional members about this c hange in strategy, and i n what

form these comm unica tions shoul d take place.

Correcting Bad Moves

The second type of mid-cour se correcti on involves recti fying inef-

fective talent d eplo yment decisions. It is import ant to acknowledge

to yourself tha t bein g a good talent str ategi st doe sn’t m ean th at

you’re omnisci ent. In most large organ izati ons, a t any o ne time a

CTOorseniorexecutivemightbeaskedtoweighinondozensof

decisions regarding executive a ssess ment, hiring, pla cemen t, reten-

tion, and sever ance. Occas ional ly, some of t hese decisions wi ll be

based on faulty or inc omplete informat ion, l eading to bad hiri ng

and bad promotional decisi ons. One of the act ions that you can

take to control or minimize such p roble ms is t o lear n to re cogni ze

the warning signs of a bad mo ve, pa r t icu larly those related to hir-

ing or promotio nal de cision s.

The Six Warning Signs of a Bad Hiring Decision

Let’s start wit h hiring dec ision s. Dur ing the first six m onths that a

new leader is on board with your organization , ther e are s ix warn-

ing signs can alert yo u to th e fact that y our ne w hire is hea ded for

trouble:

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