A boot to the system: how does a training company shake up its leadership style? It marches its managers off to boot camp

T+D, March, 2003 by Jim Ronan

When General Physics decided to improve the leadership abilities of its managers, it insisted on a program that would deliver lasting, ongoing change. After looking at external options, GP's leaders built the program themselves. This is what happened.

Three years ago, senior leaders at General Physics determined that the company's managers needed development, especially those in middle and upper levels. George Gehringer, director of professional development, says that the company was struggling on all leadership fronts. "We were ineffective at communicating, establishing goals, empowering others, and managing performance."

But how could that be? GP, with global headquarters in Elkridge, Maryland, is a prominent training and workforce development company that serves several Fortune 100 clients. The company was successful, with dedicated employees doing good work, but there was an undercurrent of anxiety regarding management style. Craig Killough, a member of GP's senior management team and a graduate of the United States Naval Academy, encouraged GP's president to consider a leadership boot camp. The SMT asked Gehringer to develop and implement the idea.

GP had access to a wealth of leadership development materials and expertise through an acquisition made in 1998. The acquired company was a supplier of soft-skills training to large manufacturing firms, and among the materials was a five-day management development training program that included the DiSC (personality inventory) instrument, a 360-degree assessment tool.

In its original format, the program had proved successful at a major automotive manufacturer, where it was offered to mid- and upper-level managers. It provided opportunity for interaction and hands-on activities, but for GP's unique needs it had to be intensified. GP cut the program to two days and placed a greater emphasis on leadership. Now called Leadership Tools and Techniques, the program became a viable, competency-based leadership development program, but it lacked punch. It needed a dramatic delivery platform.

Sergeant Death takes the stage

The official announcement of the new leadership program was made with dramatic flair at a business meeting attended by GP's directors and other top-level staff. Gehringer was expected to present a briefing on corporate professional development initiatives. Instead, dressed in battle fatigues, drill sergeant's hat, boots, and sunglasses, he took the stage and delivered an unexpected wake-up call. As Sergeant Death, he snarled and snorted his way through a detailed description of GP's new leadership boot camp. His closing comment was, "If you don't know the difference between leadership and management, then you aren't leading your staff." The logo chosen for the boot camp was a skull and crossbones. "We needed an endpoint at which we could say the ways of the past are dead and from this point forward, we're going to do the things that an effective leader does," says Gehringer.

Some among the audience thought his approach was too harsh, but most jumped to their feet and applauded the presentation and the boot camp program. Gehringer and his alter ego had surmounted a critical barrier--buy-in among the troops.

Marching orders

Before the leadership boot camp could happen, GP needed a clear, objective assessment of its current leadership behaviors. Being a training company, GP is used to assessing other organizations to determine their training needs, deliver the training, and measure the results. This time, its analysis would be self-analysis. GP had to scrutinize leadership at all levels, from all angles, and it was a humbling experience.

The senior management team developed a climate survey to address six leadership competencies and 59 associated behaviors within the organization. After several drafts, the team delivered the survey to IT, where it was reconfigured in an online format. GP translated the survey, language and culture, to meet the needs of its overseas offices. The process resulted in an instrument that could effectively evaluate leadership on a global scale.

The next step in GP's leadership assessment was the implementation of a 360-degree evaluation for each employee. GP built the 360-degree evaluation phase for a precise fit, ensuring a consistent flow of competencies and behaviors among the global climate survey, the 360-degree evaluations, and the materials taught in Leadership Tools and Techniques. Thus, the competencies measured in both the global climate survey and the individual 360degree evaluations were the same:

* managing change

* leadership

* motivation

* managing conflict, performance, and empowerment.

GP would address all of the competencies in the boot camp training.

Finally, participants-or "boots" as they would soon be called-were identified, and officers were picked to co-facilitate the instruction with trainers who had already delivered this program. The selected officers went through a brief train-the-trainer course in anticipation of their important new roles. The decision to have officers was based on a couple reasons: One, it would lend credence to the materials, giving the perception that they came from the boss. Executives would now have to walk the talk. Two, they'd also have to learn the stuff.