University of Minnesota - UMN Executive Leadership Insights
Feeding Your Leadership Pipeline
Book

Feeding Your Leadership Pipeline

How to Develop the Next Generation of Leaders in Small to Mid-Sized Companies

Daniel R. Tobin
ASTD Publications, 2010
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Editorial Rating

7

Qualities

  • Applicable

Recommendation

Developing leaders means finding people with the skills, knowledge and personality to steer your company. Dan Tobin’s straightforward, if sometimes plodding, guide spells out the basics of creating and managing “leadership development programs” (LDPs). These employee-training efforts are not difficult to implement, and they offer organizations huge benefits. Discovering future leaders in-house means you can nurture and train your own best people to understand your goals, values, and vision. getAbstract found Tobin’s use of checklists and forms practical and useful, and recommends this guidebook to HR professionals at small and medium-sized firms and to all those who want to best leverage their employees’ talents to serve their organization’s future.

Summary

“Leadership Development Programs”

As Americans get older and retire, the nation faces a shortage of skilled, experienced workers. Over the next two decades, 78 million baby boomers will become older than 65. In 2005, workers aged 55 and older made up 16% of the US workforce. By 2020, this should rise to almost 25%.

Many companies send young leadership candidates to external development programs. Larger firms sometimes pursue another alternative: in-house leadership development programs (LDPs). Internal programs can be just as expensive as external setups, which may be one reason that small firms (fewer than 5,000 employees) rarely design and operate their own, tailored LDPs. Yet, like big corporations, small and mid-sized companies also need to identify, teach, and coach a base of future leaders who know their industries – and their values – and commit to sustain them.

Since most small to mid-sized firms lack structured LDPs, they rely on their human resources (HR) departments to create leadership development and succession plans. HR must understand each unit’s various leadership requirements and identify employees who have appropriate talents.

Core Competencies...

About the Author

Daniel R. Tobin founded the Digital Equipment Corporation’s Network University and Wang/Getrionics Virtual University; he devoted more than 15 years to creating and honing the “leadership development program model.”

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