Allen Austin | Executive Integration

Executive Integration

Once a candidate is hired, we conduct a formal follow-up process for a period of two years. We will typically check on the candidate's performance at intervals of one week; 30 days; 90 days; 180 days; one year; 18 months; and two years. In some cases, however, I have stayed in close contact with candidates on an informal basis for as long as 20 years.

During the follow-up stage, we try as best we can to assist both candidate and client with the executive integration and assimilation process because we believe this is vital to the success of the newly placed executive. We also provide clients and candidates with a helpful book calledNew Role, New Reality by Dr. John Burdett.

While successful integration is much more complex, the basic message is that the job of a candidate's successful integration into their new role and new company is the responsibility of both the candidate and the company that hired them. Indeed, we have found that a new hire has the greatest chance of success when both parties-the candidate and the client-take responsibility for the integration process.

When tracking candidate performance it is important to track the candidate's view and not just the hiring authority's perception. Countless surveys have been conducted along these lines. Here are the results of a recent study published in ExecuNet.

EXECUTIVES RATE ATTRIBUTES MOST RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR CAREER SUCCESS

1. Ability to achieve objectives........................................................21.2%

2. The value of my professional work.................................................13.7%

3. Impact on the company's financial performance..................................13.5%

4. Relationships with superiors.........................................................12.0%

5. Ability to develop and retain key talent on my team.............................11.5%

6. Educational background................................................................9.6%

7. My willingness to accept developmental assignments.............................7.9%

8. My willingness to relocate during my career.......................................6.2%

9. Advanced training I have received in my function.................................3.0%

10. Other......................................................................................1.4%

A clear understanding of how highly experienced business professionals view their career successes can give you powerful insight as they formulate search and recruiting, as well as retention strategies.

According to Dr. Burdett, recent research suggests that at least 40% of those moving in to a new role struggle. For CEO's the statistic is closer to 60%. John is a Canadian consultant with whom our consulting organization has a relationship. He has written some of the best material I've ever read on leadership, culture and executive integration. Not surprisingly, Canadian statistics are almost identical to those we've observed in America.

There are a number of reasons why executives derail when they move in to a new role. Inadequate definition of the role, poor recruitment practices and lack of openness during the hiring process all play their part. High on any list of why those moving into a new role stumble, however, is that they are given little or no support during the crucial integration period.

This omission is quite remarkable when you think about the overall cost of hiring, and/or the additional cost of having someone in a leadership role who is struggling to find his or her feet. The reality: the faster an executive integrates in to the new role, the faster he or she can begin to produce value for the organization. The challenge: the time that an executive is given to prove him/herself is getting ever shorter. The rate of change, the speed at which the business world changes, leaves little room for someone sitting on the sidelines to wait and learn the plays.

Integration support also has a significant impact on leadership retention. Talented people stay with an organization for all sorts of reasons: the reputation of the organization, a sense of accomplishment, freedom to act, the feeling that he/she is making a difference. More important than anything else, however, is the quality of learning offered by the organization. It is a perception that is created, for better or for worse, as soon as a new executive joins the organization. For the established executive, that initial feeling is revisited every time he or she moves in to a new role. Lack of support during those early and anxious days mean not only a costly waiting period while the new executive gets up to speed, but it may well mean the loss of that executive the next time he or she is courted. At a time of dramatic shortfalls in leadership talent, these are business issues that cannot be ignored.

In talking about executive integration, we are not limited to those who move between organizations - although this is an important issue. Merger and acquisition means that many of the key roles change, and change dramatically. An organization going through what is often referred to as "culture change" of necessity redefines the role of every leader in the organization. A move to another country even where, at first glance, the work seems to be the same, invariably means that the role has changed. Promotion, internal transfer and new leadership challenge mean that the leader in question has to think anew his or her role.

Need executive integration be problematical? Need there be a 40% failure rate? The answer is a resounding NO! Having said that, without a new approach, little will change. A better way is possible only if the organization introduces the tools that allow the new executive to take responsibility for his or her own integration. Equally important, a better way is possible only where the new executive is given a clear path to follow.

Those who successfully move in to a new role quickly realize that flexibility, openness and a willingness to learn are the name of the game. The new executive must become the observer of his/her own behavior, to ask new questions and to draw new insights from the experience.

Not so long ago the term executive would have applied only to a relatively small group of "top" people. Today, with the flattening of organizational structures, the pushing of decision-making closer to the customer, the term "executive" should rightfully be applied to anyone who has the opportunity to shape the nature and breadth of their contribution.

Executives, in the modern organization, thus do not necessarily carry glamorous titles or operate out of a prestigious office along mahogany row. An executive is simply someone who, through initiative, creativity and a willingness to act, makes a significant difference to the way the company creates value for its customers. Using this definition means that executives can be found at every level and in all parts of the organization.

Executive integration is an important issue. It is also a practical issue. If you have just moved in to a new role, you cannot afford to fail. If you are the hiring executive, you cannot afford anything less than total success.

For the new executive, around every turn there is a large hole filled with muddy water - and the new executive in his/her new shoes! A new course: Where'd this wind come from? No one mentioned these frequent gusts. And everywhere else, silence! Where's that guy that coached you out the door?

Then there is the landing. Even those who have made many jumps can crash on landing. Executives faced with a new role will, if forced to be candid, confess to experiencing a range of emotions, most of them negative. Words like "confusing," "chaotic," "frustrating," and "overwhelming" come mixed with phrases like "there is no one to talk to," "you wouldn't believe how they...."

Put simply, moving into or assuming a new role is a difficult period in any executive's working life, and he or she enters into the new situation feeling profoundly at risk. Get it right, successfully scramble through the early days, and the feelings of inadequacy quickly fade. Get it wrong and those early negative impressions concerning the organization and his or her place within it, will be very difficult to overcome. A few wrong turns during the integration period can take an executive off the corporate map and into hostile territory.

Getting the best out of the integration opportunity is really about attitude. It is about emotional commitment and being willing to see what others describe as a burden, as a rich learning experience. The real spirit, and thus mastery, of executive integration lies in the belief that confusion, frustration and occasional bouts of depression are merely the price to pay for a unique opportunity to better know one's self.

The good news is executive integration doesn't have to be a debilitating experience. It need not be a combination of scavenger hunt and obstacle course. Those who have framed each integration experience as a self-development opportunity, those who have found the techniques for coping and the strategies for achieving, have discovered that success in a new role is ultimately a process that, like any other, can be learned.

Without getting too poetic, a worthwhile integration process unfolds much like a flower when it receives sunlight. The flower cannot move into full bloom, however, unless the soil is rich enough to sustain its growth. The nurturing mix that sustains the integration process is emotional discipline and positive self-analysis - characteristics that are critical to the first stage of integration: Letting Go and Setting a New Course.

This first stage of moving in to a new role is not an element of the process that once completed can be set aside. Those going through the integration process inevitably find themselves falling back into old ways of thinking and behaving. The executive will be tempted, simply because of his or her new workload, to put integration as a specific activity on the back burner. Doing so allows those old patterns to re-emerge. The reality: energizing the integration process is an ever-present challenge.

One might look to a number of people and places for support during a change in role. Clearly the search consultant - assuming there is one - should play a role, as should the Human Resource executive involved. The hiring executive has a strong vested interest. Colleagues, subordinates and customers also have a stake in the new executive's success. Yet, there is really only one place where responsibility rests, only one person to whom failure can be a lasting setback and only one person who can truly make it happen: the executive who, as a result of transfer, promotion, acquisition, merger, selection, or simply as a consequence of ongoing change, finds that he/she is faced with the reality of success in a new role.

Others can and should provide support. A mentor can be the source of new questions and insights. The hiring executive can help identify potholes in the road ahead. But only the new executive is in the position to put it all together.

Our orientation, our current ways of behaving, our mind-sets (mental models) regarding a new role, are the outcome of a series of competing emotional forces:

What worked in the past.
The executive's view of an ideal future.
Early signals about what success looks like.
The executive's values and beliefs.
Role models from previous business experience.

During the integration process, the new executive is operating at a heightened level of awareness. This extreme sense of the new reality is both necessary and, paradoxically, potentially damaging; necessary because the new executive is after all crossing new terrain and potentially damaging because as a direct result of this heightened sense, insecurity starts to creep in and with it the propensity to default in favor of past behavior. What is often misunderstood is the extent to which what worked in the past can be, and often is, a barrier to developing new ways to act and think.

The implications for those moving in to a new role are profound. Previous experience and past assumption of success become the filters through which new opportunities are judged. Established ways to be, and past solutions become, the "established tools of the trade" and are presumed to have primacy regardless of the situation.

By way of example it is not at all unusual for executives, even a year or more into a new role, to continue to refer to past experience as the basis for proposed change in the new organization: "Let me tell you how we did this in my past organization." In doing so, the individual concerned is not only unknowingly alienating his/her new colleagues, but through frames of reference telling others, "I'm not sure if I want to be part of this team." The message they give out is that their head and their hand may be committed to the new role but their heart and spirit lies elsewhere.

The new executive must be willing to let go of language, especially metaphors that present imagery that is misaligned with the new culture. Metaphors that strike male images ("we have to put the puck in the net this time") in an environment where a high percentage of the team are women; win-lose language ("kill the competition") where the business environment is one highly dependent upon alliances; and language that frames performance as being the prerogative of individual success but where the climate is one highly dependent upon the team ("when the ice is thin success goes to the fastest skater") all serve to set the new executive apart, all significantly limit what is possible. For a leader language isn't merely important - language is everything! Language gives potency to an idea, language energizes, language engages, language provides meaning, and language translates concepts into action. But only if it is the right language!

Integration, when everything else is stripped away, is about two things: the ability to fit in and the ability to manage expectations. Inappropriate behavior with regard to either can lead to difficulties. Managing expectations ultimately comes down to the nature, quality and timing of delivery. Fit is another matter altogether.

Fit is largely to do with overall presentation, personal style, orientation, language and pace. The higher the quality of the gem, the more time and effort needs to be spent on crafting the setting. Fit begins as an issue before the start date for the new role. Fit is a feature of the integration equation from the very first time there is contact. It is a product of trust, sensitivity and, above all else, awareness. From the very first interaction the new executive needs to have his/her antennae fully extended. An outstanding salesman or saleswoman does this naturally. Indeed, top sales people are the grand masters of political astuteness. Similarly, the new executive needs to become quickly attuned to his or her new political andsocial environment.

Past experience can be both a source of strength, and the source of what often amounts to a skewed view of the new reality. Some specialists, for example, are invariably skilled at identifying the fiscal or technical issues but lack judgment when it comes to people. And make no mistake, fit is a "people issue".

There are many things that the new executive should be assessing. The following questions, however, loom high in any assessment of fit: how does this organization create value for its customers? Does moving in to the new role entail, for me, new ways to think? To act? To feel? How is the company organized? Is there a well-defined strategy? What is it? What stories are being told? What systems dominate? What values are implied by the behavior I come across? What gets measured? How do teams act? What is the commitment to teamwork? How do teams communicate with other teams? How do key individuals behave? What seems to drive them? What do they talk about? Where, and on what, is there a real focus (discipline)?

Fit is a two-way process. Starting to understand what drives the organization and how people behave is not the same as fit. The new executive needs to not only be conscious of how others behave, but be acutely aware of his or her own actions. He or she needs to put him or herself into the shoes of those he or she meets, and ask how does this person perceive me? What sort of individual does he or she think I am?

Learning to let go and settling is the ability to move into someone else's body and see the world from their point of view. Also key is the ability to step back from the ongoing communication and become both participant and observer. In third position, the individual displays an ability to interpret the ongoing interpersonal dance, and anticipate moves in order to lead or follow as desired.

Fit is the positive outcome of heightened awareness. Fit is about listening. It is, ultimately, about making personal adjustment - something that is highly unlikely if the new executive is stuck in first position. Gathering information is a first position attribute. Awareness, knowing and acting with purpose are possible only if the new executive moves comfortably and elegantly, as needed, through all three positions.

A move into a new role is a little like traveling to a new country. At the point of departure, everything is compatible. The language is easy to understand and if something goes wrong, knowing how to get it fixed is relatively straightforward. Upon arrival, everything changes. There is a new language to contend with. There are new customs and new ways to get things done. Even the police can't be assumed to have the same priorities. The likelihood is that even the climate will be different. And if the plane is delayed and plans have been disrupted, panic is not an uncommon response.

Arrival is a far less stressful experience if a friend or colleague who knows the environment is waiting on the tarmac. With an intra-company move, that is indeed a possibility. For an executive moving into a new organization, it is far less likely.

For a politician to get elected and hold power, he or she must have a constituency of support. For executives to even start to compete at the highest level, they too must be given support. Without a network even the brightest and best executives are destined to get lost. Without a constituency the new executive will feel as if they've wandered into a constantly reconfiguring maze.

A constituency, of course, is exactly what the new executive doesn't have. He or she, therefore, needs to build one - an untenable goal if the new executive sits in his or her office waiting for the world to knock on the door.

John Burdett says much more about executive integration in our favorite book and roadmap for our role in executive integration, or on-boardingNew Role New Reality.