The Turnaround Leader
“It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”
Prof. Albus Dumbledore. (Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets – 2002).
It is indeed interesting that if you analyze the advice of Prof. Dumbledore to Harry Potter and apply it to contemporary business and leadership thinking, ideas around being a ‘Turnaround Leader’ or ‘Impact Leader’ would most likely emerge. A leader who has a habit of turning around failing or underperforming enterprises, be it in a retail setting, office setting, even a school or hospital setting, is obviously going to be impactful and that impact is because of careful choices that they made. They can usually be found easily enough, as the data on the performance is hard to miss. If there is something to benchmark the data to a “Leadership Standard” for the organization, then the task of identifying a turnaround leader becomes easier and potentially transparent. An often-unrecognized metric is the plethora of testimonials when the impactful turnaround leader moves to another location. The tears by team members when the turnaround leader leaves or their suggestions as to how to keep them or stop them from leaving, are all indicators of an impactful turnaround leader.
Of course, any leader that turns an enterprise back into being an ongoing concern is going to be loved by their staff, since the actions of the leader have saved their jobs and livelihood. That said, a true turnaround leader would say it was a team effort. This is often a hallmark of such a leader. They know that they worked hard to bring the team along with them, but they also know that if the team had not embarked on the journey with them, very little would have happened. The miracles that did happen, would have been nothing but a pipedream.
It might seem simple but impactful turnaround leadership can often begin with a simple idea. You get back as much as you give! In an interview with Forbes, Connie Bobo (CEO of Mind Your Mission), explained it like this.
“At its core, leadership is about connecting with people. The truth is that human beings are social creatures and we’re hardwired to do business with people we like. So when you generously give without expecting anything in return, you win!…It’s true that generosity doesn’t always result in reciprocity. The person you give to might not be the one who directly gives back to you. Does this mean you won’t get anything in return? Absolutely not. For one thing, you’ll become a better person — more attuned to the needs of others around you — and there are huge business benefits that come as a result of empathy.”
Bobo, Connie (2021). The Secret To Leading With Impact: The More You Give, The More You Get (Forbes March 29, 2021).
The importance of the leader connecting with people, staff, and customers alike, and extending the generosity of their time to get to know their team and what makes each person ‘tick’, is fundamental to any leadership that sees relationships as critical. The job of the leader is to find ways to help each team member to be the best iteration of themselves they can be each day. Mark C Crowley in his excellent book ‘Lead from the Heart’ makes the connection between the leader connecting with people and their success.
“Much of this has to do with the fact that our employees need and want greater connection with their leader. That’s not to suggest they want a deeply personal relationship. They don’t at all. Our greatest impact with people is to gain insight into what motivates and inspires them in their lives. It also includes spending time with them for the purpose of discovering what may be limiting their highest effectiveness – even if that includes challenges in their own lives. On display is our desire to help every employee succeed and grow. People understand that we give time to things that are most important to us. And when people sense they matter and feel valued they instinctively become more engaged and more productive. It’s a huge motivational force.”
Crowley, Mark. C. (2011). Lead From the Heart (eBook). Bloomington, Indiana: Balboa Press. p81
Fundamentally, the turnaround leader is seeking to make an impact, as soon as possible. Notwithstanding their context, the turnaround leader needs to enliven the team not burn them out and recognize the critical importance of giving the team something to buy into. After all, if the business is in need of turnaround leadership, clearly the team needs something or someone to believe in. A grounding principle for the turnaround leader is to leave the team, the business, and the customers, better for the turnaround leader having been there. Richard Sheridan in his excellent book, ‘Chief Joy Officer’ puts it this way.
“I recall from my Boy Scout days the idea… to “leave the campsite better than you found it”…To the extent, I can do this every single day as a leader at work—and can help others do this too—I find my calling and my fulfillment. I wish you great success in your own quest for joyful leadership and the impact it can create in the lives of others.”
Sheridan, Richard. (2018). Chief Joy Officer. New York: Penguin. p174.
As true as this is and certainly it is a philosophy that any leader, especially someone new to leadership, should practice, it’s what you do in the ‘in-between time’, in what might seem at times to be the ‘shadowland of leadership’, that is also important. Having observed turnaround leaders and even worked with a few, the one thing they often have in common, whether instinctively or because they have heard about, is their focus on high-quality relationships with the team, within the team, and their customers. The leader that can demonstrate a genuine concern for the members of their team, create the circumstances in which each team member can ‘buy-in’ to the leader and what they are trying to achieve. One well-researched approach, with multiple studies, across15 industries and 20 countries, was provided by Jody Hoffer Gittell (Professor of Management at Brandeis University’s Heller School for Social Policy & Management), in her work on ‘Relational Coordination’. She puts forward ‘Seven Principles to Connect Across Roles at Work’. In the Huffington Post, Prof. Jody Hoffer Gittell identified them as follows.
Relational coordination has seven simple yet powerful principles to connect the various players:
- Frequent communication
- Timely communication
- Accurate communication
- Problem-solving communication
- Shared goals
- Shared knowledge
- Mutual respect
These principles can be applied to any work process that needs coordination, whether in a face-to-face team, across departments or throughout the entire organization—even across organizations in your supply network and even with your customers.
Gittell, Jody Hoffer. (2016). “Relational Coordination Offers Seven Principles to Connect Across Roles at Work” In Huffington Post (Sept 26, 2016)
What is interesting is the emphasis that Prof. Jody Hoffer Gittell puts on communication, as identified in the first 4 of the 7 principles, with principles 5 and 6 requiring communication to make it happen. One could argue that ‘mutual respect’ is evidenced in how people communicate with each other, formal and informal, verbal and non-verbal, with of course the key ingredient being listening. At the heart of all high-quality relationships, personal and professional is excellence in communication and that means listening. For more detail, this author would highly recommend her book from Stanford University Press, ‘Transforming relationships for high performance: the power of relational coordination’
It might seem simple but impactful turnaround leadership can often begin with a simple idea. You get back as much as you give!
The culture of the organization has a lot to do with how successful the turnaround leader might initially be. It is not uncommon for staff to cling to the ‘old ways’ of doing things, acting as a roadblock to change. One of the reasons why relationships is critical in any enterprise, particularly for a turnaround leader, is because it helps build credibility. Without credibility, people will find it hard to listen and hard to follow the instructions of the leader. As relationships derive from excellence in communication, it is reasonable to conclude ‘ipso facto’, that credibility does also, especially if one considers actions to be an overt means of communication. There is much truth to the phrase ‘actions speak louder than words. Communication underpins credibility and credibility means gaining trust. Doug Conant made this observation on Twitter.
“Organizations often struggle with performance issues and never make a connection between the trust levels within the culture of the organization. Remember that everyone on your team is a person first, and then an employee. Dial into their humanity to earn trust.” Doug Conant (Twitter 11 March 2022) (Australian Time)
In the end, trust and trustworthy are words that are often found with words like honesty and are often associated with people of integrity and credibility. The importance of credibility has been researched extensively in the longitudinal research of James. M. Kouzes and Barry. Z. Posner (2011). Their research confirms that the sources of credibility align perfectly with 3 of the 4 ‘Characteristics of Admired Leaders’ identified in earlier research. In other words, the leaders admired by their staff are admired and highly respected because they enjoy high levels of credibility.
“These three dimensions of source credibility are strikingly similar to three of the most frequently selected qualities in the “Characteristics of Admired Leaders” checklist: honest, competent, and inspiring. The three factors that explain why a person is a believable source of information—trustworthiness, expertise, and dynamism—are synonyms for three of the top four qualities people look for in a leader they would willingly follow….In other words, what we found quite unexpectedly in our initial research, and what has been reaffirmed since, is that above all else, people want leaders who are credible… Without credibility, dreams will die and relationships will rot.”
Kouzes, James. M., Posner, Barry. Z. (2011). Credibility: How leaders gain and lose it, why people demand it. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. pp28-29
This becomes evident when a highly impactful turnaround leader is moved to a new location to turnaround and replaced by a leader who is seen, initially at least, as being out of their depth by the team, in comparison to the leadership they just had. For the success of the turnaround leader to have longevity, the practices and processes need to be embedded within the culture and that culture respected by the new leader. Often the new leader will think that they need to undo everything that has gone before, not realizing that they are undoing practices that have led to better team morale and company profitability. The mistake made here is the assumption that practices are merely processes and therefore easily changeable. The new leader may not realize that often sitting behind the practices and processes that were established by the turnaround leader are key principles, often worked out by the team in a collaborative culture and model of leadership. Obviously, if practices and processes have become detached from the reason, intent or values that led to the establishment of such practices and processes, then obviously a revision is called for. There is a fine line between that which needs change and that which is clearly aligned to values and vision. Basing practices and processes on key principles gives the decision-making more agility, more flexibility. Louis V Gerstner, the turnaround leader that revived IBM, explains the importance of using key principles in decision-making to facilitate the turnaround of IBM.
“In an organization in which procedures had become untethered from their origins and intent, and where codification had replaced personal responsibility, the first task was to eradicate process itself…We started with a statement of principles. Why principles? Because I believe all high-performance companies are led and managed by principles, not by process. Decisions need to be made by leaders who understand the key drivers of success in the enterprise and then apply those principles to a given situation with practical wisdom, skill, and a sense of relevancy to the current environment.”
Fundamentally, the turnaround leader is a leader seeking to have a positive impact on their organization, be that a retail store, a school, a hospital, or a Government Department. They tend towards being highly relational and more often than not, are engaging the team with key principles, usually derived from within the organization. They may even follow the 7 Principles of ‘Relational Coordination’ identified by Prof. Jody Hoffer Gittell. The turnaround leader, if they are going to enjoy the respect of their team are likely to be: honest, competent, inspiring, and I would add, have a vision for the future. They see the work they do with their team as equally being work on the culture of the organization, embedding processes and practices into the culture, even if at that particular location. In a nutshell, the turnaround leader understands that involving others, getting their team to be highly engaged, leads to commitment and commitment leads to change.
“Without involvement, there is no commitment. Mark it down, asterisk it, circle it, underline it. No involvement, no commitment.”
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