Transforming the ELT (part 2 of 5)

A Note from Our Founder

It had always been a dream of mine to host and facilitate an executive leadership team retreat here in Breckenridge, CO – and that is exactly what we did with one of our clients last month!

The photos above are of my co-facilitator, Brooke Moran, and I, relishing in the excitement and joy of finishing a 1.5-day leadership development and strategic planning retreat with an incredible team.?

I can honestly say that this team fully embodied the willingness to embrace change and lead their industry into the future. We are so grateful for clients who are willing to go the distance, do the hard stuff, and come out the other end transformed into a true Enterprise Leadership Team. It’s magical to hold the space for this kind of growth.

My hope is that this newsletter, along with the others in our 5-part Enterprise Leadership series, might offer some guidance towards tapping into your own strength as a team and creating your own path for growth and success.

In your corner,

Gretchen

Transforming the ELT (Part 2 of 5): Through ROLES

When leaders take collective ownership of challenges, collaborate cross-functionally to find solutions, and support one another to achieve the organization's overarching goals, they embody an Enterprise Leadership Team.

This is an excerpt from an article our team wrote in September – Transforming the ELT: An Introductory Overview – where we considered the efficacy of transitioning from an Executive Leadership Team to an Enterprise Leadership Team.?

Recently, we helped a client’s leadership team assess their performance using our proprietary PRIDE Model. After completing their team assessment, their aggregated results revealed that their greatest opportunity was to clarify roles. While this leadership team had made significant progress in understanding the shifts needed to operate as a true enterprise team, there seemed to be a need for clearer role definitions and better collaboration to avoid confusion and ensure alignment, especially when working across functions.

A key question remained: How can we work as an enterprise leadership team — with inherently less separation between roles — while maintaining clarity about our distinct responsibilities within the organization?

Read more on how ROLES plays into transforming your team

Take Our Assessment: How’s Your Team doing?

Interested in understanding how well your team leverages their roles to build an enterprise mindset? The following statements can be rated on a scale of 1-4 (1 being strongly disagree and 4 being strongly agree).

Roles: An important factor in the development of your team is how each member contributes to the work. Effective organization design and talent development are crucial for each team member to pursue independent tasks while working as a whole.

1. Our team structure (roles, reporting, job descriptions, etc.) is effective in carrying out the work to be done, in relation to the larger organizational structure.
2. Each team member has clearly defined roles and responsibilities that allow for flexibility to execute on our shared goals and accountabilities.
3. Everyone sees their role as contributing directly to the strategic goals of the organization.
4. Our team collaborates effectively with other teams and stakeholders across the organization.
5. Our unique skills and talents are valued and utilized on our team, and there are ample development opportunities to expand abilities and contributions.

Click here to take the full assessment

An Exercise in Feedforward: To Help Further Foster Enterprise Leadership

The exercise below is one that we use with our clients. It combines self-reflection with peer feedback, promoting accountability and the development of roles that support the larger team with permission to hold each other accountable. Try it out with your own team. ?

Start, Stop, Continue

• Give each person index cards, 1 for each person in the group (i.e., if there is a group of 5 people, each person will get 5 index cards).
• Take 1 index card per team member and write down your recommendations for what that person might start, stop, and continue to do to support the team
• Share cards one-by-one with each other, giving each card to the respective person
• Once everyone gets their cards, they will then take their final index card and write down their commitments in the form of start, stop, continue, with their colleague’s feedback in mind, in addition to their own reflections. This ought to be a synthesis, rather than a laundry list.?
• Each person states and shares their commitments with the rest of the team.

As you move towards implementing an enterprise approach to leadership at all levels, this is a great way to promote effective collaboration, communication and accountability between team members.

Stay Tuned: The Next 3 Months…

Over the next three months, we’ll continue our deep dive into building a true Enterprise Leadership Team, whether at the executive level, the regional level, or any level of the organization. In so doing, we will walk the wheel of our proprietary PRIDE Model, focusing on one driver each month.

Stay tuned for next month’s article, which will focus on Infrastructure and how the processes, procedures, and tools you use can support your team’s enterprise mindset.

Our PRIDE Model is based on over 30 years of experience observing five key drivers that create the environment for healthy, high performing teams and organizations.

Purpose, Roles,?Infrastructure, Dynamics,?and Execute.

These five drivers offer a lens in which to develop your leaders, mobilize your teams, and transform your organization.

Integrated Growth Resources

• Team Effectiveness Assessment — Integrated Growth's proprietary PRIDE Model investigates 5 drivers of high-performing teams: Purpose, Roles, Infrastructure, Dynamics, and Execute

Featured Articles

• How moving beyond the traditional team model can move organizations forward (Marketplace)
• Transforming The ELT (Part 1 of 5): Through PURPOSE(Integrated Growth)
• Transforming the ELT: An Introductory Overview (Integrated Growth)

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Integrated Growth has been developing leaders, mobilizing teams, and transforming organizations since 1998. Founded by Gretchen Reid, our team of highly skilled consultants and executive coaches are known for building award winning leadership development programs, facilitating strategic planning and team development initiatives, and providing executive coaching to help you achieve your greatest mission.