Good leadership

We know that good leadership is an essential part of obtaining good outcomes. Not only does the academic research make this explicit, but we know that the reverse is also true (because many of us have experienced it personally – to our cost!). If you need to be convinced that Wales has to up it’s game in leadership and governance, may I invite you to read through the back catalogue of Audit Wales.

But – what does ‘good’ mean in terms of leadership, and in terms of Boards in particular?

I was reading through a post on exactly this topic recently; written by senior staff at PwC and published on a Harvard Forum on corporate governance. Some of the points felt right to me. For example, they talk about the need for strategic oversight, emotional intelligence and a commitment to the organisation’s long-term health. Emotional intelligence! Imagine that being talked about 20 years ago in relation to leadership; but now it’s taken as a given. That’s certainly an encouraging sign of progress.

They also highlight a number of other key issues that are consistent amongst most good practice discussions or guides I’ve come across, such as avoiding groupthink, and being flexible in operation so that inevitable organisational challenges can be addressed in ways that are not constrained by orthodoxy.

The authors go further, and describe eight attributes for ‘outstanding leadership’:

1. Leader of leaders (strong personal leadership and supporting others in their own leadership journey)
2. Strategic vision
3. Proactive engagement with CEO
4. Culture of trust and collaboration
5. Pragmatic and responsive
6. Fosters a high-performing team
7. Stakeholder awareness
8. Cool in a crisis

We could probably all come up with a similar list, maybe optimised for our own experiences. For example, NICW (which I Chair) doesn’t have a CEO; but my personal list would include a strong desire for transparency, which I think is a crucial part of accountability. Likewise it would surprise me if organisations in Wales didn’t include aspects of the Future Generations Act – such as long-term and preventative thinking – into a governance list of ‘Do’s’.

It’s not for me to review myself against this list (I have done it in a private capacity), but I do think there’s plenty in there that speaks to good practice which is hopefully reflected in how NICW operates. The article goes on in some detail on good and bad examples of each of the eight attributes.

Consequences of bad leadership

It doesn’t take a genius to work out that bad leadership has negative consequences for organisations. Some key ‘red flags’ that might suggest things are not working well include:

• Discourteous or intimidatory actions and behaviour (my hat is off to the Royal College of Physicisianswho procured a review into their own governance and published their findings – including this example of poor practice)
• Secrecy or inappropriate communication in decision-making without due process
• Overreach into executive activity (too ‘hands-on’)
• Lack of conflict – rubber-stamping agreement on most issues (this might be an indicator of a lack of Board diversity)
• Dominant/non-contributing members
• Lack of organisation

Whilst all the above can be addressed and is usually the responsibility of the Chair, that can take time, and anyway depends on the Chair recognising the issues and wanting to act on them. In the meantime the impacts on the organisation can be significant, both in the short and longer term.

Ultimately bad leadership that is not addressed can result in an outflow of good people, and an entrenching of bad.

So it seems that not only is bad leadership a negative in its own right, but that it becomes an increasing problem by causing good people to leave!

The good news is that some issues can be addressed, and perhaps may be an issue of ignorance rather than design. For example, a lack of the right balance of skills on a Board can be addressed through a skills audit, and via training and development.

Where Chairs are struggling to embed good practice due to Board dynamics, it might be helpful to get external support – certainly this is a case of money well spent if the organisation is large and has responsibility for delivering services to large numbers of people.

I have previously written about examples of things going wrong – how much better would it be for the £25m spend by community councils in Wales that is judged as ‘qualified’; or for postmasters in the Horizon scandal, if poor leadership had been addressed at an early stage?

I believe that most leaders in Wales are trying to do the right thing in the right way. But we must all be vigilant against bad practice, and hungry for good practice!

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This blog post is the personal opinion of David Clubb. No AI was used for any part of creating or refining this blog post. It’s entirely the product of my own brain.

Photo by Populimedia – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0