Dissatisfaction is high and it’s time to do something about it

According to the Kelly Global Workforce Index employees worldwide give their managers only a marginal ‘pass’ mark for overall performance in the way they lead their teams. Across all regions, managers score just 6.4 out of a possible 10 points—well below the high-performance level that many companies would hope to achieve.

It’s tempting to dismiss this as employees simply asking ‘too much’ of managers, yet the widespread nature of this assessment suggests that people’s experiences of leadership are generally average at best.

If this is the case, the chance of employees learning strong leadership skills from their managers are low and companies need to consider how to teach and promote the concept of leadership more directly. To put it simply, we need to stop thinking strong leaders are going to come out of environments with consistently poor leadership role models to learn from.

• What is your current leadership environment and how do you evaluate it?
• How does your organization strengthen the links between management and their teams?
• How does your organization identify and assess leadership potential?

For more on improving organizational leadership, download my latest Ebook, 7 Lessons for Good Leaders.