Services - Constultation

Executive Effectiveness Process

Question: What makes the Executive Effectiveness process of Dimension Five Consultants so productive?

Answer: High speed, incisive and insightful counsel which receptive clients use as life-changing and career-building paving stones.

PAVING STONES

Executive Effectiveness Process
Dimension Five Consultants, Inc.

The impact of the executive development process of Dimension Five Consultants, Executive Integrity, can be predicted by client response. Insights provided to participants through our Executive Integrity process can become paving stones. Incisive observations and recommendations build bridges to the future for receptive clients. Each stone reflects experienced–based counsel, directed toward enhanced productivity. Issues and circumstances vary; however, 8000 client responses, over twenty-four years, follow a pattern.

First, there are the stone throwers. These individuals are presented with insights, which are provided to them in the form of solid observations, concerns and suggestions. These bricks and stones are delivered quickly and directly, and can be eye-opening, sometimes jarring, to the recipient. Certain people feel that this forthrightness is intrusive, painful, irrelevant and a waste of time. These participants, disturbed by the approach or the content, or both, elect to throw the paving bricks of advice and counsel right back into the lap of the provider. These people want no part of this development approach. They oppose the process and desire to exit the program as quickly as possible.

What these individuals typically want is feedback that provides reassuring confirmation of their current power and effectiveness. Challenges to their self-perception are met with resistance as they reject certain paving stones of insight. They nonverbally and verbally communicate a desire to fire back the stones with a vengeance. However, what generally prevents a stronger reaction to the process is their concern about their organizational position. Even so, they throw the insights and recommendations back, consistently defending their own greater wisdom about leadership, listening, interpersonal ease and organizational impact. They gain very little.

Second, there are the wall-builders. These clients are more passive, appearing to accept each stone of counsel. They nod knowingly, appreciatively and smile, all the while searching for non-confrontational ways to side-step any accountability for changing behavior. Brick by brick and paving stone by insightful paving stone, they erect their wall of resistance and their avoidance techniques can be exhausting. What they seek is political survival while minimizing either learning or transformation.

They are curious, but they reject genuine connections to change. They are looking for metrics to give their analytical minds the opportunity to rationalize the status quo and maintain their own comfort zone. The wall-building approach allows for the appearance of engagement, without embracing the value of feedback or the motivation that can emerge from practical insights. Typically, these individuals like wearing the uniform of power and responsibility, yet are unwilling to internalize the disciplines required to function as role models, measured by integrity-centered decision-making. Creating fewer waves than the stone throwers, they manage to side-step engagement with the process, avoid growth and risk their own careers by erecting a protective wall with the very paving stones that might have helped them to improve.

Third, there are integrity-centered career-builders. These are leaders who thrive on learning and seek input and advice. Incisive and insightful counsel provides them with paving stones which they utilize to build their future. They know that recognizing their own vulnerabilities can be significant in leveraging their other talents. Criticism is welcomed as a building block. Feedback that offers challenge is embraced as a further confirmation that continuous improvement is the only sure path to success in a highly competitive world. Building this pathway to increased productivity often requires paving stones provided by counselors, mentors and caring colleagues. Those who embrace wisdom with responsiveness are better able to leverage relationships with actions which are the stepping stones to success. Like iron ore that must go through the purifying fires of heat as it makes its way to becoming a refined life-sustaining mechanism of a pacemaker, so too must the aspiring world-class executive be willing to accept the challenges for growth that create and sustain leadership excellence!

One wise advisor reminded us that our clients do not care how much we know until they know how much we care. When the supportive atmosphere is clear, then participants know that Dimension Five’s Executive Effectiveness process is intended only to assist those who select its counsel. When clients understand how important it is to be the best that they can be; then, and sometimes only then, are the most valuable and incisive insights leveraged. Change and growth begin with listening.