Take me to your Leader

If you should encounter a Martian and he requested you to take him to your leader, would you?

The following is an extract of a real event that took place in the Middle East during February this year. It relates to an interview for a newly created position (leadership development and succession planning), in a leading Liquefied Natural Gas company based in Qatar.

Leading the interviewing panel was the Chief Operating Officer , a national. In attendance were 2 fellow nationals and 2 ex-pats. As the incumbent commenced a shortened version of his power point presentation, the COO proceeded to scan the screen of his much coveted Blackberry. At the end of the second very brief presentation on Leadership Development, question time arrived. The questions from the ex-pats related to points made during the presentations. Then the COO, raising his eyes from the blackberry  decided to interrogate the presenter with questions rather unrelated to the presentations and served to show his power in the presence of his subordinates. Questions, presented in a critical tone, dealing with  strengths and weaknesses and length of duration at previous companies (on interim assignments) were clearly aimed at creating a negative interviewing experience. To further show his ignorance, this COO continued with responses such as “So you think you’re perfect?” when he was unable to add any meaningful input. It was rather embarrassing for the presenter to have to listen to the totally unprepared “leader” engaging in such a juvenile show of power. I am reminded of the well known quote by Kouzes and Posner “Your position gives you authority, your behaviour earns you respect”

Why it was decided to interview the incumbent in the first place only the COO would know. More importantly and intriguing is the fact that the company leadership decided to place the ultimate responsibility of introducing exemplary leadership behaviours in the hands of someone who will never do justice to this important role. How dis-empowering it must be for the person who ultimately is appointed into this token position to have to report to someone who will never understand the critical responsibility for ensuring sound leadership behaviours in the workplace.

The incumbent in this interview decided to do the honourable thing and withdraw his interest in this position. Any one with a sense of dignity would do the same. It makes a mockery of the leadership debate to think that a major and highly profitable organisation allows this important initiative to become nothing more than window dressing.  I was left wondering what sense, if any, an alien would make of this. Perhaps as much as the incumbent did as he was flown in for the interview and must have thought he landed on another planet.

How frequently do incidents such as this occur? Have you experienced toxic leader behaviour? Perhaps the following article will prompt you to share your encounter.
toxic_leadership_career_development


Take me to your Leader was first posted on July 23, 2011 at 5:18 pm.
©2011 “Organisational Leadership“. Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at [email protected]

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Link to original posthttp://transperform.uk.com/blog


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Take me to your Leader

If you should encounter a Martian and he requested you to take him to your leader, would you?

The following is an extract of a real event that took place in theMiddle East during February this year. It relates to an interview for a newly created position (leadership development and succession planning), in a leading Liquefied Natural Gas company based in Qatar.

Leading the interviewing panel was the Chief Operating Officer , a national. In attendance were 2 fellow nationals and 2 ex-pats. As the incumbent commenced a shortened version of his power point presentation, the COO proceeded to scan the screen of his much coveted Blackberry. At the end of the second very brief presentation on Leadership Development, question time arrived. The questions from the ex-pats related to points made during the presentations. Then the COO, raising his eyes from the blackberry  decided to interrogate the presenter with questions rather unrelated to the presentations and served to show his power in the presence of his subordinates. Questions, presented in a critical tone, dealing with  strengths and weaknesses and length of duration at previous companies (on interim assignments) were clearly aimed at creating a negative interviewing experience. To further show his ignorance, this COO continued with responses such as “So you think you’re perfect?” when he was unable to add any meaningful input. It was rather embarrassing for the presenter to have to listen to the totally unprepared “leader” engaging in such a juvenile show of power. I am reminded of the well known quote by Kouzes and Posner “Your position gives you authority, your behaviour earns you respect”

Why it was decided to interview the incumbent in the first place only the COO would know. More importantly and intriguing is the fact that the company leadership decided to place the ultimate responsibility of introducing exemplary leadership behaviours in the hands of someone who will never do justice to this important role. How dis-empowering it must be for the person who ultimately is appointed into this token position to have to report to someone who will never understand the critical responsibility for ensuring sound leadership behaviours in the workplace.

The incumbent in this interview decided to do the honourable thing and withdraw his interest in this position. Any one with a sense of dignity would do the same. It makes a mockery of the leadership debate to think that a major and highly profitable organisation allows this important initiative to become nothing more than window dressing.  I was left wondering what sense, if any, an alien would make of this. Perhaps as much as the incumbent did as he was flown in for the interview and must have thought he landed on another planet.

How frequently do incidents such as this occur? Have you experienced toxic leader behaviour? Perhaps the following article will prompt you to share your encounter.
toxic_leadership_career_development


Take me to your Leader was first posted on July 23, 2011 at 5:18 pm.
©2011 “Organisational Leadership“. Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at [email protected]

Feed enhanced by the Add To Feed Plugin by Ajay D’Souza

Link to original posthttp://transperform.uk.com/blog


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