Particularly in New Zealand, we have many capable, driven natural leaders. We’ve developed our leadership capabilities arguably mostly through living in a small country where innovation has necessarily had to play a key part in our commercial survival. We’re generally pretty resilient and we like to test new frontiers.

However, there are also people who are appointed to leadership positions who are not natural leaders, and who sometimes struggle with delivering leadership.

Unfortunately, if leaders fail to provide effective leadership, and within the ranks of those who they are responsible for leading is one or more person who has natural leadership talents, then it is not uncommon for the natural leader(s) to push forward and demonstrate their natural leadership capabilities. 

People in governance positions (i.e. directors) need to be aware of this tendency and become instrumental in either:

a) Help manage (constructively) the tendency of a natural leader to provide leadership beyond their station, and/ or

b) Review the effectiveness of the current leader (e.g. the GM) and be decisive about either helping the incumbent to develop the necessary leadership skills that they may be missing or consider replacing the current leader with a person who the governance body considers would be more suitable to be the leader.

 

Clear signs of ineffective leadership being the case include:

  • “Fires” (political mainly) regularly flare-up within the organisation, which require constant attention to “put out” (extinguish).
  • The organisation doesn’t take many significant steps forward or look to change how it operates markedly.
  • Issues of even minor significance are regularly referred to shareholders for a resolution, rather than resolved at a governance level – or by the CEO/ GM.
  • Low levels of compliance among shareholders/ other internal stakeholders – people basically please themselves.
  • The organisation suffers from a low level of brand awareness in the market, and quite possibly only commands a modest share of the market which they operate in.