JT (formerly known as Jersey Telecom) has introduced a leadership development initiative centred on an aspirational profile of a senior manager in a bid to encourage proactive organisational change.
The company undertook a rebranding exercise last year as part of a new five-year growth strategy intended to take it beyond its civil service background, beyond telecoms and beyond its domestic market in Jersey.
But as part of the move, the supplier was also keen to shift from more traditional process-driven ways of working and adopt a more dynamic approach in a bid to compete more effectively on an international basis.
As a result, the decision was taken to devise a new leadership development scheme. Nicola Reeves, JT’s head of performance & people development, explained: “Our 24 senior leaders are the ones who will drive the growth in the business, so it was logical to start a development initiative with them, as they set the example for everyone else.”
The organisation’s HR team set up a discussion meeting, in which senior managers debated what type of leadership would be required to meet future challenges.
“With them, we agreed on five core leadership competencies. They decided which behaviours should be included, so the resultant competency framework is theirs, not something that has been imposed upon them,” Reeves said.
The decision was also taken to adopt an assessment-based approach, which included the creation of baseline metrics to enable before and after performance comparisons and the devising of specific development goals.
“In the past, we’ve invested in leadership development, and it has been enjoyable, but nothing has really changed as there’s been no measurement, no metrics and no consequences,” Reeves explained. “We wanted to instil in people a real desire to improve, through an active engagement process, which focussed on long-term and on-going assessment and support.”
Ideal leader profile
To this end, JT partnered with
Talent Q, which mapped the former’s leadership competency framework against its Dimensions personality questionnaire. The vendor also devised a 360-degree feedback document so that leaders could compare how they perceived themselves against the views of others.
The firm likewise worked with JT to create a template or ‘gold standard’ of the ideal company leader.
Reeves, together with JT’s HR Director and Talent Q’s Head of learning and development then hosted one-to-one sessions with each of the leaders in order to give them individual feedback on their strengths and weaknesses.
Each senior manager was then helped to write their own personal development plan and was likewise given the option of choosing the intervention, ranging from coaching to training, that they felt would best suit their needs.
“We deliberately made our ideal leader profile highly aspirational, as we didn’t want our senior leaders to think they didn’t need to change,” said Reeves. “We wanted gaps between each person’s profile and the ideal profile, to give them areas for development. The ideal leader profile has proved invaluable as we can also use it as a benchmark in recruitment and succession planning.”
After six months, the goal is to assess the leaders again using a 360-degree feedback mechanism in order to see how beneficial their development activities have been in practice. The aim is then to undertake reassessments annually as part of the appraisal process.
Over time, however, an adapted scheme will also be introduced for the 35 managers who report into the senior leadership team.
“We’ll then move on to a third stage for employees further down the organisation – in particular for ‘young talent’. This will help us to embed key skills and to identify candidates for succession planning,” Reeve concluded.
