Agency principals rank importance of leadership skills

Rough Notes, Jun 1999 by Antrim, Doron

MAXIMIZING PRODUCTIVITY

"In the good old days it was easy to outsell my problems. No more!" Tommy Corkhill, owner of an agency in Orlando, Florida, said that a few years ago when we were conducting research for the handbook in agency leadership best practices that we were writing for the AIAA. Tommy's point, of course, was that the new challenges facing agency leaders cannot be met just by cranking up production efforts. Clearly, agencies remain sales and service organizations. And maintaining an effective sales culture is a challenge that all must meet. But, as Tommy recognized, that is no longer enough. Increasingly, agency leaders also must be competent in new ways of managing their business and leading their people.

What are these "new ways" of managing and leading? How can agency principals gain the competencies they need to keep up with the new challenges they are facing? And what tools can they use to select and train the individuals who will become the agency's future leaders?

We recently addressed these questions with the agency partners of Assurex International. We started by asking for their opinions on what the new ways of managing and leading an agency are. The result is a prioritized ranking of the tasks that Assurex partners believe future agency leaders must be very competent at performing-a partial job description (minus sales/production activities) for what we call the New Age Agency Leader.

Fifty Assurex CEOs completed a simple questionnaire. It listed the 10 groups of leadership tasks that are shown in the table on page 59, and it asked the CEOs how important they believe competency in each group will be to success as an agency leader. The CEOs rated each group on a scale of 7, where 7 was "very important," 4 was "important," and 1 was "not important." They could select any one of these ratings, or one of the numbers in between. They also were encouraged to add comments and to identify any tasks not included in the survey list that they felt were important.

The table lists the groups in rank order, from the highest average importance rating received to the lowest. Leading people is clearly top on the list. It was rated "very important" (7) by 38 of the 50 CEOs. A close second was strategic analysis and planning, which received 34 "very important" ratings. All of the groups were rated "very important" by 10 CEOs. And 492 of the 500 total ratings received (one rating for each of 10 groups on 50 questionnaires) were at the important level (4) or above. There is no doubt that Assurex CEOs believe the future leaders of their agencies will have to be good at performing each of the tasks listed in the survey. In addition, a significant number of the respondents added financial acumen and management as an 11th group of tasks.

Defining the tasks a new age leader must be good at performing is just the first step in helping present and future leaders become more effective. The second step is to identify the personal traits and characteristics that can influence a leader's effectiveness. Third, tests and tools can be designed that help to identify and prioritize any needs leaders may have for training and skill development.

The final step is to develop a broad range of training activities from which agents can select the activities that meet their individual needs. We envision a curriculum that would address each of the task groups. It would include workshops and seminars in addition to self-study modules and tools.

We are working toward that final step and have made progress on steps two and three. Available to interested readers (without charge) are simple self-evaluation tools to help leaders assess their own development needs or the needs of others (see next page). We anticipate that how to select and develop new age agency leaders will continue to be the subject of future columns.

The point here is that Assurex CEOs have identified the tasks they believe agency leaders will increasingly have to be good at performing. Like Tommy Corkhill, they know that they cannot outsell the problems posed by a changing business environment. Perhaps it's time for all agency leaders to ask themselves, "How good am I at performing these tasks?"

Free tools available

Woodgate Partners will send its "model" of the Key Success Criteria for New Age Agency Leaders together with self-evaluation tools to agency principals without charge or obligation. Just fax your request to (410) 8332650. Or, get more information as well as request the tools and other free materials by visiting the Woodgate Partners' web site (http://www.woodgatepartners.com).

The author

Doron (Bud) Antrim is managing partner of Woodgate Partners LLC, a firm that delivers tools, training, and coaching to leaders and staff who want to facilitate change and maximize productivity in their agency. He welcomes the opportunity to clarify or expand on any aspect of his column and can be reached by e-mail at mail@woodgate partners.com or by phone at (410) 833-6468.