The EQ Leader

Chapter 15What 360s Can Tell Us about Leaders and Potential Leaders

I think it's very important to have a feedback loop, where you're constantly thinking about what you've done and how you could be doing it better.

—ELON MUSK

How Can We Better Assess High Potentials or Emerging Leaders?

What more can we do to identify and develop potential future leaders? At Discovery Learning International, now a part of Multi-Health Systems, a tool was developed to identify competencies of emerging leaders. Competencies are behaviors or sets of behaviors relevant to success for, in this case, leadership. The first step in developing the model was to identify the competencies necessary for success both in business school and for long-term success as business leaders. The idea was to identify competencies that are enduring throughout a career, rather than for a specific role, and facilitating of success at all levels. By identifying and measuring these competencies, business schools, students, and companies can focus on training and developing behaviors that are most relevant to very successful individuals.

The aforementioned project began by reviewing the competency modeling and 360-degree feedback literature, including resources specifically pertaining to the success of MBA and EMBA students. A preliminary model was developed, consisting of 14 competencies.¹ From this, the goal was to create a tool that is easy to implement and interpret, and would create the foundation for a family of ...