As your organization evolves it is vital for ongoing growth to ensure that your leadership team continues to perform at a high level. When everybody is doing their best, growth is going to be more assured, and bumps in the road are easier to overcome.

Every C-level leader on your team should have a clear and accurate description of their role within the organization, and what is expected of them. It’s also a good practice to use job descriptions to develop key-end results for each team member.

By taking into account the desired results, you can create a short list of bullet points for your C-level leaders to use daily, to keep their focus on what they need to do and how they need to perform in their role. This clarifies roles and responsibilities and ensures that everybody handles their own work responsibilities consistenly. (The key end results approach can work for everyone in the organization.)

If you want an innovative approach to evaluating leadership performance you may appreciate the methodology we’ve developed to help organizations stay on top of performance as needs change.

It begins with a self-evaluation completed by the leader based on the particular requirements of their role. After their self-evaluation is complete, they may also ask their boss and select direct reports to complete the same evaluation. You may have your own evaluation approach, but we have one that works well with our clients. (Note – this is not a periodic performance review. It’s more of a periodic measure to true-up what a person can do to improve.)

We also rely on BestWork, a psychometric instrument based on the Big Five Personality Traits and a cognitive processing component. This looks at a leader’s hard-wired traits. We can look at how these align with the evolving needs of the role in the business.

Finally, we recommend that a CEO do a gut-level rating of his or her direct reports on a scale of 1 to 5. If a leader is not performing well at all in their role, they would be assessed as a 1, and should be replaced as quickly as possible. A leader rated 2 is struggling and needs significant support and improvement to remain in the role. A leader rated 3 is competent, but with room to improve. This is likely where a new leader will land, with hopes that they are growing rapidly toward a higher number. A leader rated 4 is performing very well and is a solid player on your team. And a leader rated 5 is exceptional, performing above and beyond, and is likely a role model and mentor for other members of the team.

If you would like to talk about leadership in your organization as you grow, we’re always happy to talk and share our insights.