Great Strategy Starts with Great People—and Great People Follow Great Leaders
In today’s evolving marketplace, Pharma companies continue to adjust their strategic approach with how they go to market, to drive revenue and optimize profitability. The approach is to hire the best talent and then provide those people with the right strategic plan and resources to succeed. This approach assumes that top talent, operating at their highest level and executing the ideal strategy gives you the greatest chance at success. This makes sense, right?
If this is accurate, making this approach work requires the following critical success factors:
• Attract and hire the best talent
• Foster a workplace to be highly engaging, competent, and productive
• Enable them to create the ideal strategic approach and then execute it flawlessly
• Retain this talent to stay with the organization
All of this is true and it’s what many companies aspire to create culturally. The challenge that they have is an understanding of what it takes to accomplish this.
The good news is that there is one common factor, one secret ingredient, that can ensure that all of this comes to fruition: leadership. Hiring and developing the best leaders is the game changer. The reason is that strong leaders hire great talent and then shape the environment where that talent can thrive (to engage, to develop, to perform). It is also leadership that is directly responsible (in many cases) for the retention of top talent.
“Hiring and developing the best leaders is the game changer. The reason is that strong leaders hire great talent and then shape the environment where that talent can thrive.”
There is, in fact, substantial research and data that support the importance of great leadership. According to the Gallup Organization, great leadership (versus average or poor) can result in 2.5x more employee engagement, ~20% increase in employee productivity, ~43% less employee turnover, ~50% greater increase in profits, and ~150% greater earnings per share versus the competition. This data is across multiple industries and based upon years of research and millions of data points.
The reason why it applies across industry is because the tenets of great leaders are foundational regardless of industry. The challenge is that we tend to overlook this critical linchpin to our business. Many times, leadership quality is taken for granted. It is assumed that once someone ascends to a certain level within the business, they must have the skills to be a great leader (whether in a supervisory role or as an influential cross-functional). This is far from the truth. In fact, a 2016 Gallup Poll revealed that 82% of leaders are not very good at leading people. Part of the issue is that we are not selecting the right people for these roles. The other, larger reason is that we are not investing in their development.
When you consider the statistics related to the impact of great leaders, why are more companies not putting a greater strategic emphasis on this? And we’re not just talking about managing others—this is a skillset relevant to both individual contributors and those in formal management roles. After all, leaders are people that we follow. Why do we follow great leaders? Because they are the secret ingredient that we are drawn to.
