Thursday, August 6, 2009

Talent Selection & Strategy: What style CEO performs best?

In 1995, New York Times science reporter, Daniel Goleman, released Emotional Intelligence (EI) which created a new movement in evaluation of leaders and talent.  The EI study followed Goleman's Primal Leadership which was also favorably received by graduate business schools like Harvard.

The basis of EI evaluation of executive talent is that broad based intelligent leadership is much better than narrowly focused, hard driving leadership -  dynamic relater like was perceived as much better than a slash and burn leader like "Chainsaw" Al Dunlap.

But, does Goleman's supposition hold true in the real world?  Or is it just the latest rebuke of the centurys old, first study of executive talent, The Prince?

Researchers at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business decided to study CEO performance for themselves, evaluating 225 CEOs profiles from Topgrading research interviews.  They compared and contrasted the performance of Emotionally Intelligent CEOs (lambs) versus results-oriented, Type A intesity CEOs (cheetahs).

The high cost of CEO turnover was at the heart of this talent analysis.  Two thirds of CEOs fail to meet the objectives they were hired to achieve and stay an average of 18 months.  The Chicago GSB results differed significantly with the now politically correct EI view of leadership.

Regardless of the level of position, talent acquisition strategies and talent selection processes need to employ a thorough evaluation of finalist candidates whether they are internal candidates, from corporate recruiting, or from an external custom recruiting project.  The Topgrading method of talent evaluation contrasts with psychometric testing methods.  Executive recruiting should include multiple methods of finalist evaluation.

No comments:

Post a Comment