Was tun Sie, wenn es Ihrer Social-Impact-Organisation an effektiver Führung mangelt?

Customize your approach to addressing leadership gaps based on the specific circumstances and underlying causes. Temporary issues may require temporary support mechanisms, such as additional training or workload adjustments, to aid leaders during transitional periods.

Ineffective leadership absolutely has to be addressed. First get concrete on what the issues are, is it skill, values, communication style, lack of vision? Understanding where the gaps reside will ensure conversations are productive, transparent and effective.

Not all errors are failures in leadership. Assess whether leadership is learning from its mistakes and if there are appropriate channels to provide feedback so they are aware of mistakes. Here's a scale to consider from a session on failing forward at Stanford's me2we conference: Sabotage - most blameworthy Inattention - more blameworthy Inability - blameworthy Challenge - praiseworthy Uncertainty - more praiseworthy Experimentation - most praiseworthy For example if they experimented with a new leadership approach and failed, but learned from it this is praiseworthy. Often we are biased towards assigning blame when there is an opportunity to learn and praise the fact that we can learn as teams from those errors.

Encourage an environment where honest and constructive communication is valued and promoted. Foster open dialogue between leaders, team members, and stakeholders to address concerns and expectations transparently.

Communication is a dealbreaker for any organization. The lines of communication has to be consistent up and down the chain of command.

First address how urgent it is to communicate your concerns. It's rarely a matter of life-or-death, so stepping away from the situation, collecting your thoughts, or sleeping on it is the first step. From there, consider if it something you can bring up in a touch-base? Or the next performance review? If the concern is shared by many, one tool I use often is a retrospective. Templates for running a project/program retrospective are easily available. Ask your leader or middle manager to consider having a retrospective so that the team and organization can grow the most from the experience. The space must be neutral - where wins and misses are both shared. They can be done efficiently and shortly within as little as 30 minutes.

Promote a learning culture that values continuous personal and professional development. Encourage employees to pursue opportunities for skill enhancement, whether through training programs, workshops, or self-directed learning.

If your organization is a non-profit or public-benefit corporation, then you have the unique opportunity to engage the organization's board, who's role it is to oversee and guide executive leadership. Do not engage this option lightly, as directly engaging the board could be seen as highly inappropriate in some settings, and very welcome in others. If your organization has events where employees regularly meet board members, this is a sign that it is a more open culture. If not, then be prepared. Before exploring this option, consider if you have done your best to create an evidenced narrative about leadership that is a shared experience across colleagues, and have exhausted appropriate channels to remediate leadership failures.