Future-Proof Your Business: Developing Tomorrow’s Leaders Today

Preparing emerging leaders isn’t just about nurturing individual talent; it’s a strategic move to position your business for sustainable growth. 

To achieve this growth, many successful organisations turn to the Scaling Up methodology, a proven approach to scaling business operations while maintaining excellence. In this blog, we’ll explore key steps to prepare and empower the leaders of tomorrow while simultaneously growing your business.

Identify Potential Leaders (The Growth Seedlings)

The first step is to identify individuals who exhibit leadership potential, align with your company’s core values and vision and have consistently high performance. These are usually your “A Players”, which you can easily identify using a tool such as the Talent Assessment Chart from Scaling Up. 

The ‘Competency And Behaviour Ability To Change Chart’ is also a helpful tool used in the recruiting process, that can also be used to evaluate your current team members and their leadership potential. This chart outlines characteristics of a person’s attitude. If someone doesn’t possess the critical competencies, it is unlikely they will become a great leader in the business and drive future growth. 

Provide Leadership Training (Fertilize the Ground)

Many companies make the mistake of waiting until individuals have been promoted into a leadership role before investing in their leadership development. It is important to have a more proactive strategy that helps prepare individuals for future leadership roles, improve their engagement and position the business for long-term success. Waiting until they are in leadership roles may result in missed opportunities and potentially costly leadership gaps.

Enrolling your emerging leaders into intensive workshops, seminars and training programs will have the greatest impact on theirs and the businesses future growth. However, if you are a small or medium business without the budget available to do this, there are other ways you can provide development.

Consider the following:

• Stretch Assignments: Give emerging leaders the chance to take on challenging projects or roles that stretch their skills and responsibilities. These “stretch assignments” allow them to develop leadership skills in a safe and supportive environment.
• Cross-Functional Teams: Encourage emerging leaders to participate in cross-functional teams or projects. This exposes them to different aspects of the business and helps them develop collaboration, communication, and problem-solving skills.
• Feedback and Assessment: Provide regular feedback and performance assessments to emerging leaders. This helps them identify areas for improvement and set goals for their leadership development.
• Encourage Self-Development: Promote a culture of continuous learning and self-development. Encourage emerging leaders to seek out resources, books, online courses, and other learning opportunities related to leadership.
• Leadership Simulations: Use leadership simulations or role-playing exercises to provide practical experience in leadership scenarios. These can help emerging leaders practice decision-making, conflict resolution, and communication skills.
• Soft Skills Training: Invest in training on essential soft skills such as emotional intelligence, empathy, active listening, and effective communication, as these are critical for leadership success.
• Regular Check-Ins: Schedule regular check-ins with emerging leaders to discuss their development progress, provide support, and adjust development plans as needed.

Mentorship and Coaching (Nurturing the Saplings)

Pairing emerging leaders with experienced mentors within the organisation is a great way to provide guidance, share experiences, and offer advice on leadership skills. This one-on-one interaction is a valuable form of leadership development.

Before beginning a mentorship program, clearly define the objectives and goals. What do you want to achieve, and how will you measure success? Ensure alignment between the program’s goals and the broader organisational strategy.

Once you have determined the goals, decide the structure of the program, including the duration, frequency of meetings, and the format of interactions (e.g., one-on-one mentoring, group mentoring, or a combination). Decide whether the program will be formal (with assigned mentors) or informal (encouraging employees to seek out mentors themselves). Create a program timeline and set expectations for participants. Be sure to match mentors and mentees thoughtfully, considering factors such as career aspirations, personalities, and communication styles. Allow some flexibility for mentees to request specific mentors if they have a preference.

Empower your Leaders (Letting them Bloom)

Once your emerging leaders have been identified, provided leadership development training and mentorship, encourage them to start taking more ownership in their current roles and empower them to make critical decisions. By granting decision-making authority, you not only develop their leadership skills but also enable your business to respond quickly to growth-related challenges and opportunities.

Alignment is fundamental at this stage – clearly define the expectations and responsibilities of emerging leaders, ensuring they understand how their roles contribute to the company’s growth objectives. For example, if you plan to expand into new markets, communicate how each emerging leader’s contributions will impact the success of that expansion.

By preparing emerging leaders for future challenges, you set your business on a trajectory of sustainable growth. As your emerging leaders flourish, your business scales, and you can harvest the benefits of a thriving, growing organisation that excels in its industry.

TED BONEL, SCALING UP COACH – STRATEGY & EXECUTION BUSINESS ADVISORS

Need assistance to help your team achieve your objectives to grow your business? Contact me at tedb@strategyandexecution.com.au to schedule a free 30-minute discovery meeting.

ABOUT STRATEGY & EXECUTION

We have been providing organisations and their leaders with facilitation support and executive education focused on strategy development and strategy execution for more than 20 years. Using business models such as Scaling Up, Exponential Organizations, E-Myth Mastery, Outthinker etc, we support organisations seeking to create or refine excellent strategies and execute them quickly and effectively.

Our expertise is based on a mixture of wide business experience, effective tools as well as a great deal of consulting and executive education. Our approach to working with clients is as unique as our specialist focus. We always seek to challenge our clients’ thinking – but equally are unafraid to roll up our sleeves and help execute the ideas we help generate. Learn more about us here or view our upcoming workshops and events.

If you are preparing for strategy development and/or a strategy implementation challenge and are committed to creating value for your organisation, we look forward to hearing from you. Contact us now