Shifting Minds Limited  Registered office: Twyford House, 51 Twyford Avenue, London, N2 9NR, United Kingdom. 

Website:  www.shiftingminds.com  Copyright © 2023 Shifting Minds Limited    

Registered Limited Company 05003036    VAT Registration 832 3704 46

Enquiry

020 8374 3985

We have worked with:-

Private Sector

BT

Muller

SABMiller

AllianzGI

WPP

West Coast Partnership

Discovery Communications

Marks and Spencer

Manpower

Hays

GE

Brambles

Siegwek

Hitachi Rail

Kaplan Financial

Aircom International

Airwave

Spire Payments

Devonshire

Salt

BPP

TubeLines

Nexen

Cabot Financial

OPC Consultancy

MI Sport

People & Partners

Energise Consultancy

Salt Recruitment

Devonshire Recruitment

Consult HR

Mutual Bank

UK Retail Banks

Merchant Banks

Insurance companies

Engineering companies

High street retailers

Global Management Consultancies

Public Sector

BBC

HMRC

Post Office

NHS

Citizen’s Advice

Basingstoke Council

Ken and Chelsea Council

Northamptonshire Council

East Sussex council

Hampshire Council

City Council

Health authority

3rd Sector

Marie Curie Cancer Care

Prostate Cancer UK

Royal College of  Nursing

City and Guilds

YMCA

ABE

Family Housing

Peabody Trust

World Animal Protection

Do your managers pass the leadership test?

So many directors, managers and team leaders fail the leadership test. So what is it? Well early on in our leadership training programmes we asked participants to think about who was their best manager ever. Some come up with an answer, others find it more difficult (which actually represents a different problem). We allow them then to talk briefly about the person they have chosen and we record their attributes on a flip-chart. Then we ask the more important question which is “if some of your staff were on this programme, would they talk about you?” This is our leadership test

We have been running leadership programmes for many years and they are normally attended by a wide range of people from director level, through senior management levels, and all the way down to first-line managers. The senior guys identify themselves as “leaders” however we have to spend a little more time persuading those further down the hierarchy that they too are leaders of people – with all that entails.

“There are lots of very average managers in the modern business world”

Our belief is that the modern business world is full of “averagely performing managers”, but managers who can also display true leadership qualities are in much shorter supply. This is the point that our programs seek to address. To help bring about this change we often use detailed 360° leadership feedback from themselves, their manager or director and of course for reports/peers. (We are licensed to use a number of third party leadership 360° instruments, or we are happy to use your own in-house frameworks)

Our approach is challenging for participants – we start our courses by jointly exploring what an excellent management/leadership looks like through a number of means. The first approach is by exploring the personality traits and skills used by excellent manager/leaders (including your frameworks); we then look at situational leadership so that our participants understand that management/leadership style is contingent on the context. Finally we look at recent notions of the leader as “hero” i.e., effective leaders can get results in any context. Once re-established what effective management/leadership looks like we then ask the question “how do the needs of your organisation affects management/leadership style?” By the end of this process we have real clarity about what really effective management/leadership should look like in your organisation.

“If that’s what my organisation wants - what am I giving them?”

At this point we are ready to reveal how each participant is actually performing, but before we can do this we spend a little time talking to participants about how to receive and process feedback. There is always much anticipation ahead of the distribution of the 360° reports – so when we give them out we are careful to help each individual walk-through the results so that they get the big picture, and especially that they notice the good things they do as well as the areas for improvement. Whilst the results are sinking in we put the participants into pairs so that they can start to coach each other to get below the surface of the issues raised by the 360 report. (In many leadership programmes this also provides a good opportunity to introduce the whole concept of performance coaching). The aim of the coaching conversation is for each participant to examine two or three “weak” areas and start the process of understanding/taking action to improve.

Together with some focus group work on key areas such as empowerment, managing performance and creating a true leadership culture, this sequence of activities often forms a great first day/module within a more comprehensive leadership programme. A typical format for a leadership programme is shown in the box opposite.

Our overall aim is to help your managers, team leaders and indeed even directors pass the critical leadership test!