There aren’t enough global leaders to go around, but there is a framework available to ensure global leadership development efforts produce the pipeline businesses need.
Globalization has effected major changes in the business environment. As the world shrinks and globalization increases, companies are constantly changing strategies and operational procedures. Having the right leaders at international and multinational companies is critical to corporate performance. Managers and executives need to be able to motivate, influence and enable individuals across national boundaries and cultures to accomplish a company’s goals.
Part of a global leader’s impact is that person’s ability to increase an organization’s capacity to evolve into a global company and to grow a business strategy for the larger global marketplace. This kind of corporate evolution demands that an organization prepare future leaders who can successfully carry out global corporate strategy. Global leadership development (GLD) provides much-needed competency.
Why Is There a Global Leadership Shortage?
Global leadership demands are qualitatively different and significantly more complex than those for domestic leadership. Leadership values in different locales also vary. Further, there is a shortage of global leaders which hinders companies’ global business strategy execution. In previous generations, the global leadership competency was not required. However, changing business environments and the shortage of prepared global leaders creates an immediate and critical need for global leadership development.
GLD programs to address the gap between global leadership needs and the capacity shortage should be a major focus for talent management and learning and development leaders.
The lack of leaders ready to take on global roles in emerging and expanding markets indicates that learning leaders’ current GLD program offerings are deficient. In DDI’s Global Leadership Forecast 2011, only 38 percent of the 12,423 leaders who participated reported the quality of leadership in their organizations as very good or excellent. Worse, only 18 percent of HR professionals surveyed reported a strong bench to meet future business needs.
Despite these dismal statistics, there is a growing consensus around the most valuable global leadership attributes: personality, values, cultural background and corporate work experience; global leadership competencies: engagement in personal transformation, knowledge, networking skills, social judgment skills, self-awareness and self-regulation; and learning and development methods: expatriate assignment, global teams, experiential learning, coaching, intercultural training, assessment and reflection.
Subject: Building a Global Leadership Pipeline - The importance of Global Leadership 
Wed Apr 23, 2014 2:00 am
