A health care company with executive leaders located in different states throughout the United States needed better ways to lead their company as a cohesive team. Individuals expressed they working too much without enough time to lead as proactively as they needed to and to collaborate successfully as a team. Because they worked remotely and supervised people in multiple states, it was more difficult to figure out what was working and what wasn’t and how to improve – both vertically and laterally.
As a result, individual leaders felt they worked in reactive modes without enough support and time to be innovative, to develop their direct reports and to lead the company in alignment with its vision.
Because leaders only met with each other in person on a quarterly basis, they didn’t have the type of relationships with one another that would make it easy to ask for help. They also didn’t know how or what to ask for. In order to adjust the team culture, we determined that the leadership team needed a perspective on who they are as team and an evaluation of what their strengths and weaknesses to figure out how and what to improve upon.
In order to generate a holistic feedback mechanism, we designed a customized 360 review process based on a company-specific leadership competency model. As a result of the 360 review, team members received feedback specific to their individual leadership performance and thematically about team functioning and culture. The feedback revealed an organizational need for better delegation and improved cross-functional collaboration.
We developed an executive coaching and training program to assist team members to develop skills, mindsets and habits for successful delegation and cross-functional collaboration. As team members changed how they worked together, they trained their direct reports on improving delegation and collaboration. New behaviors of delegating and collaborating cross-functionally began to emerge throughout the company and integrated into the culture
