BY SEGUN MOJEED
It was the management guru Peter Drucker who said there is no success without a successor. Therefore, for a leader to be deemed successful, she or he must make the growing and, or grooming of the next generation leaders his/her priority. In other words, no matter how successful a leader thinks he is, the evidence is in how many capable successors are jostling to take over from him when he approaches his retirement or when there is the need for him to step aside for any reason whatsoever. By the way, let me own up that this article first appeared in its raw form in a Ghanaian newspaper I was contributing to a couple of years back. However, we have now repackaged it with lots of new information as it is fast transforming into a beautiful quick-read ‘small book’.
Jack Welch, the enigmatic former Chairman and Chief Executive of General Electric, once said, “Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. However, when you become a leader, success is all about growing others.” Mr Welch should know. He grew people. Legend has it that at the time of his exit from GE, there were at least four capable hands ready to assume the No. 1 position at GE. It was reported that other equally big rival organisations were waiting in the wings to snatch whoever was not picked as CEO at GE. In fact, it was said that private jets were waiting to whisk away those who may ‘lose out’ in the keenly contested succession ‘battle’ at GE. That was how enormous GE had invested in growing people. The company has a University for growing people at Crotonville, NY established since 1956. When eventually Jeffrey Immelt was picked, a guy like Larry Bossidy had no issue assuming duty almost immediately as the CEO of an equally big organisation. Today ‘Neutron Jack’ as he was nick-named for another reason entirely, still goes around the world spreading his leadership philosophy of growing people.
All my life, I have been into growing people. At a point I was being grown, then I was growing myself, and now I grow people and I’m still growing. My growing up years were in four different locations, all within this beautiful landscape called Nigeria. I was blessed with parents who provided for me a solid upbringing moving me between Abealala, Idiogba and Aiyetoro in Ilaje Ese Odo, and Odolewu, Itamapako in Ijebu land. My dad, a fine goldsmith, one of the best of his era, was so much into the politics of his days. He would ‘encourage’ us to take him (in a canoe of course, what do you expect in the Ese Odo of the 60s, a Limousine?
The only car in that region in those years belonged to Oba Akins of Aiyetoro Community), to AG (Action Group) meetings. One of his siblings was even nicknamed ‘AG on Top’. For him, cajoling us to follow him to these meetings was his own way of grooming us to develop interest in politics. He would also do the same thing when it was time for the meetings of ‘Egbe Omo Ijebu in the Diaspora’. This diaspora being Ilaje Ese Odo up to the Ijaw Arogbo towns of Apata and Ajapa (Igbenne), all in the Niger Delta. He was a prominent leader in both groups. His concern was always for us his children to ‘get it’ as in today’s vocab, and be involved. It was like he wanted to groom a successor, and almost none of us was interested in partisan politics, especially with the eventual discouraging ‘Wild, Wild, West. He also taught us goldsmithing hands-on, the art of teeth-shinning dross off gold to reveal the shinning precious metal. One of these days, I’ll share my mum’s role in all these.
Later I was shipped off to Lagos to squat with three different families in Mushin and Campos Square (t’eku igboro), Catholic Mission to be precise, respectively. The three families influenced and affected my journey in life differently. One was particularly focused insisting I must continue my education and do well. I’ll call him the focused family. The other two families adopted a kind of laissez-faire attitude in handling me. There was no deliberateness, no specific actions. I was a known face at Jebako and Rainbow cinemas at Idioro, skipping school many times. That was the first two years of my high school and the results were woeful.
On the other hand, the focused family sat me down, made me sign an undertaken to be of good behaviour. There was a roster for sleeping during the day, siesta, and reading throughout the night or at least most of the night. Results? I was catapulted from those red-ink result sheets to all black by the time I was ending my year three and moving on to the senior classes. Growing people is a deliberate choice. The head of the focused family would wake up in the night just to support and cheer me on. That is why everywhere I go today I celebrate my elder brother Tunde. He is the head of the focused family.
In growing people, pay attention to the young ones in our midst. That was the subject of my first two articles on this platform. My dad’s people growing efforts paid off at the community development level. As far back as a teenager, I teamed up with other youngsters of Odolewu, my town, like Femi Adenuga, Martins Adefuye, Nola Giwa, the late Ayo Ajinde, and Sikiru Balogun, and a few others to form the Omolewu Youths Organisation (OLYO 78) under the leadership and patronship of late Sikiru Ayinde Oluwo. He was already a successful accountant who was eager to grow us to contribute our quota to the development of the town and its environ. He was always in the trenches with us rolling up his sleeves and getting his hands dirty for us to achieve our goals. This General led from the front. He was later to play a pivotal role in my career as an HR professional.
We had and still have other seniors we looked, and still looking up to till these days, almost telling ourselves something like “when I grow up I want to be like you!” Late Amos Adenuga was a vocal leader, who said it the way it was. He suffered no fool. He had no patience for mediocrity. So also is Aresco, our own Senator Tony Adefuye, a quintessential investor in the younger generation. In this small town is also Tunde Odeyingbo, forever a gentleman who used to shelter me generously whenever I strolled into Jos town while doing my NYSC primary assignment in Misau, Bauchi State, some thirty two years ago, and would spend time sharing with me about the vicissitudes of life. It is a long list of growers of people that I’m privileged to know. We were learning and growing under their tutelage.
Leadership can be demonstrated at every level and stratum of the society. It is so sad and a thing of grave concern when leaders find it difficult to find successors among their team members. Something must have gone wrong by error of omission or commission. Wicked, or what I term ‘bad belle’ politics must have been at play. For instance, I’m aware of a former Premiership coach whose leadership success story/principle is reportedly being taught at Harvard but I keep asking myself what manner of leadership success? He was in charge at the club for at least 25 years and yet when it was time for him to go, he hurriedly picked a successor who almost relegated the club. He did not grow a successor. It was as if he was much fixated on immediate successes as represented by trophies and the stock market that he forgot about the essence of the future and business continuity, people.
“It is so sad and a thing of grave concern when leaders find it difficult to find successors among their team members. Something must have gone wrong by error of omission or commission”
Growing people is one subject I can never talk too much about, or teach too much or discuss too much. It drives all other levers of human endeavours, aspirations and progress. Leaders are responsible for growing people because they are managers of people and all other resources. Just like you have heard it often said, everything rises and falls with leadership. Also, I unrepentantly affirm that leaving a legacy is one of the ultimate goals of leadership, the only other goal and of course higher in ranking is for a leader to fear God and finish strong. A leadership deficit in the area of growing people in any organisation or country is an invitation to disaster, an accident waiting to happen. I hear a lot of people these days screaming we must build institutions, build infrastructures, etc. I have no quarrel with this clamour.
My take is no matter the legislations and infrastructures, if we do not grow the people to run it, your guess is as good as mine. There is this terrible joke that if you take people from any of the Ajegunles and translocate them to Banana Island, in no distant future, Banana Island would become the new Ajegunle. Why? Simple. You have not cultivated the AJ City guys in the ways, manners and idiosyncrasies of the ‘Bananites’. On the other hand, haven’t you seen individuals who have successfully made the translocation from AJ City to Banana Island? Watch out for them. They have taken time to be grown, to learn courtesies and decorum, and they are well fitted in and settled.
“A leadership deficit in the area of growing people in any organisation or country is an invitation to dis aster, an accident waiting to happen”
Growing people is deliberate. It is a major antidote for the leadership deficit we see all around us and at all levels. Quality leadership has been far in-between in this part of the world – leaders with the servant-leader mind-set, leaders who are truly selfless, leaders who from the onset are concerned about the future of the entity they lead, leaders who subscribe to such ideals as: ‘leaders eat last’, ‘leaders are readers’, ‘righteousness exalts a nation’ ‘leadership is no position; it is responsibility’, ‘leaders must add value or get out of the way for those who will’, ‘humility is essential for exaltation’, and so on.
It is, therefore, the responsibility of a leader to groom the next generation of leaders; and growing or developing people is no rocket science. The key to doing it effectively is to catch people doing something right, reinforce it by rewarding it in whichever way legitimate and within the budget. Why won’t a leader grow people? Or why won’t a leader want to groom anyone? Why is this hard to do? Maybe for the fear of being outshone by a protégé. This fear drives some leaders to a position of ‘do nothing’ or they ‘creatively’ device all forms of ingenuity to install their puppets or try all tricks in the books to perpetuate themselves in office. We see this every day in both the private and public sectors, even in some developed economies. You would probably agree with me that for most of us, our DNA is wired to catching people doing something wrong. It is not your fault. It is largely due to how we were raised. We see it every day being demonstrated, live, in our society.
Have you not seen the traffic officer waiting patiently for you to ignorantly drive into a one-way street that has no directional sign? It is even rumoured that the signs were deliberately removed to cause people ‘to sin’. How do we catch people doing something right? I have, over the years, taught and practised ‘Management By Waka-About – MBWA’. It is a principle that says, ‘don’t just sit back in the comfort of your exalted office, wherever that may be’. Leadership at whatever situate and level – family, community, organisations – micro, small, medium or large, political, social or religious, must cultivate the good habit of a deliberate weekly wandering around their base with the aim of catching people doing things right. There is a necessity, an urgent need to unlearn the theory X mind-set which stigmatises human beings as always wanting to do evil and incapable of self-starting – ever asking ‘can anything good come out of Nazareth?’ Plenty of good things actually came out of Nazareth. A solid example is our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ! A basic truism is you get to see what you are looking out for.
When people are caught doing the right things, what next do we do in this growing people process? First, know that the behaviour that gets rewarded gets repeated. Next, reward and reinforce good behaviours. If not, the good behaviour would not be repeated and the bad ones would hold sway. When a good performance is commended and that quickly too, it is in the nature of humans to want to continue such behaviour. In the same vein, do not overlook or ignore bad behaviours. Bad behaviours are toxic, get them quarantined as soon as possible to forestall an epidemic. Ostracise evil doers, condemn unwholesome behaviour in clear language. Do not couch it in semantics or else those on the borderline or swing state may be tempted to swing the way of bad people. That is why they call some people principled leaders. They call a spade a spade. They are not ‘diplomatic’ on core values of integrity, honesty, employee experience, EX; customer experience, CX; etc. Infractions are dealt with pronto!
“…Behaviour that gets rewarded gets repeated. …Reward and reinforce good behaviours. If not, the good behaviour would not be repeated and the bad ones would hold sway”
One other frequently overlooked powerful force in this developmental process is the power of feedback. Rick Tate said feedback is the breakfast of champions. You may have observed in big athletics meetings how a high jumper goes over to his or her trainer in the stands for some pep talk and feedback before making another attempt. Someone said feedback is the most cost-effective strategy for improving performance and instilling satisfaction, and it can turn people around fast. Make feedback quick and immediate either good or bad. Do not wait until the almighty appraisal period and do not keep a ‘black book’ of offences and shortcomings. While providing feedback, dwell on strengths most of the time using the CRACC model of commending, recommending and crucially confronting. More so as we witness the influx of the younger generations into all spheres of human endeavour, workplace, worship centres, politics, etc.
Whatever worked for the older generations are no longer necessarily working for youngsters. For instance, the generation Z cohort enjoys instant feedback. This encourages and validates them. They don’t have the patience of ‘grandpa’ Boomers. They want it and they want it now. I don’t know who is still doing once a year performance appraisal; it is long outdated and obsolete. It no longer captures or measures performance in true sense of it. Leveraging on technology, performance can now be measured real time giving these dynamic to dynamite generations a sense of belonging and a platform to exhale and excel.
* ‘Growing People’ is BezaleelConsulting’s (www.bezaleelconsultingrw.com) bye-line and it was inspired by an old Chinese adage which says: “If you are planning for a season, grow rice. If you are planning for a decade, grow trees. If you are planning for centuries, grow people.”
To be continued.
Acknowledgement/Sources of Resources for this article:
- BezaleelConsulting Group Library bezaleelconsultingrw.com
- Clip arts from the internet via Google