If you want to move to the next level in our career this is the right book for you! It will also provide you additional guidelines to coach people in lower level.

Although it is a book that has a lot of good insights for every type of leadership, very often I felt that I was not the target audience that the autor wanted.

This happens mainly because, although I’m a first level leader in my company, only one third of the book I was able to apply in my daily routine. Every knowledge is useful, but some knowledge is more useful than others, and that’s how my feeling split during the reading.

How are you navigating the leadership pipeline?
By Paul Laughlin · July 29, 2014
It’s unusual for me to recommend a book that I don’t consider that well written, but Leadership Pipeline is such a book. The reason for my recommendation is this book effectively covers a key challenge for leaders & organisations. It also introduces a really useful model and set of tools.
My criticism is only the writing style. Perhaps I’ve spent too many years enjoying well crafted prose in fiction but I find the style used throughout this book to be a little wooden or clunky, certainly not a joy to read.
However, I would encourage you to persist as the rewards are worth it.
Understand where you are in the pipeline
The key benefit this book offers is its central model of how a pipeline of future senior leadership talent needs to develop in order to master different levels within an organisation.
In fact this model is also useful for those who will never reach the higher echelons but need to effectively take on a different level of management or leadership challenge.
What sets this model apart from many others is its focus on the extent of change needed by an individual to effectively move from one level to another. This is visualised by a pipeline that has ‘critical passages’ or zigzag like turns in the pipe.
Behaviour needed along leadership pipeline
The reason for such sharp turns is the extent to which mastery of a new level of leadership (say moving from managing yourself to managing others, or from managing managers to functional management) requires not just acquiring new skills but also letting go of skills they have served you well at the last level. Another plus is the book is packed with case study examples of leaders who fell into such traps.
#mastery of a new level of #leadership requires letting go of #skills that got you there Share on X
Each leadership level is described in-depth, together with both the new skills to be mastered and the ones that must be let go, to succeed at that level. Over the years many of these lessons have rung true to me and I’ve seen others benefit from advice to make these transitions.
Not just for general managers
It is a book focused on a general management leadership pipeline. The priorities and examples have that bias. However, lots of the lessons are also relevant to customer insight leaders and their teams.
Chapter 12 seeks to address some of this general management bias, through specialist advice for
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Book Reviews to cross post to Amazon & Goodreads
How are you navigating the leadership pipeline?
functional leaders. Some of this could be useful to those progressing toward the more senior Customer Insight Director or Chief Knowledge Officer roles now being created. For most customer insight leaders, I would recommend the chapters on transitions from Managing Self to Managing Others to Managing Managers to being a Functional Manager. They provide rich content for mentoring or performance reviews.
As with Time To Think, I will now return to chapter 13 on coaching with a fresh perspective (to inform my coaching work).

Haven't read it yet but accidentally hit the rating button!

Bem didático, importante ler com bloco de notas ao lado

The book gives a clear distinction of leadership levels in a bigger organization from individual contributor to CEO and how they differ in terms of work values, time application and skills. You can determine the current level by observing those three factors, one of the key ideas for me was that a values shift needs to take place when moving from one level to the next (i.e. when starting to manage others one's attitude should shift from tolerating management to valuing its importance and at later levels understanding if something makes sense from business perspective instead of just trying to get everything done efficiently). In the most common deficient situations we see higher-level managers having the values and time application/skills from lower levels due to which they are not focusing on their own role expectations and this is pushing the entire organization out of balance and is breaking the succession chain. Among the biggest challenges and most common mistakes of things not done is moving those leaders back to their previous level if they are shown not to be ready for the next or have skipped some levels/value shifts along the way... A successful leadership pipeline model implementation enables to fill almost all leadership positions internally.

I could not imagine the full-scale implementation of such model in today's rapidly transforming e-commerce organization but it's definitely valuable for correcting your perspective and focus as a leader and for noticing leadership deficiencies around you. The theory and descriptions was very interesting but the application part was not so thought provoking (that's why it's 5 stars). The Leadership Pipeline model was developed in General Electric in the 1970s.

The levels (with 6 transitions between each level) top to bottom are:
- Enterprise Manager
- Group Manager
- Business Manager
- Functional Manager
- Manager of Managers
- First Line Manager
- Individual Contributors

Transitions:
- Managing self to managing others
The first step involves the employees, with still relatively little leadership experience. The employees are generally equipped with technical and professional skills, but not necessarily enhanced personal skills in terms of leading or managing others. The aim of the step is to sharpen and broaden the individual skills, with the ability to understand and accept the company culture at the top list of the skills that need to be taught.
The skills employees should be taught during the first step include planning work, assigning work, the ability to motivate and coach others, and assessment of other employees. The emphasis is on the basic functions of management, such as reallocating time and other resources.
Since time management will increase in importance as the person progresses in leadership, the ability to allocate time efficiently is crucial for further development. But aside from the behavior changes, the step also emphasizes value-based changes. The employee attitude has to shift from tolerating management to valuing its importance.
The attention must shift from purely individual-focused mindset to understanding the value of control and team effort. While the job description of the first level managers still has individual responsibilities and tasks, they must slowly start shifting the mindset towards managing others, rather than just themselves.

- Managing others to leading managers
“is the level where a company’s management foundation is constructed; level-two managers select and develop the people who will eventually become the company’s leaders”.
The second-level manager must be able to divest him- or herself from the individual tasks, to purely managing others.
The focus in terms of skills will be on the ability to assess and select others for first-level roles, assigning and assisting them with managerial work, and measuring their progress in the new role. The first-level managers essentially become the mentors on stage two. In order for the leadership pipeline model to work, the second-level candidates have to be able to understand the value-based requirements of managers.
“one of the tough responsibilities of managers of managers is to return people to individual-contributor role if first-line managers don’t shift their behaviours and values”. The other major skill to focus on at the second-level deals with coaching. Coaching of first-line managers can often be rather limited and therefore, the managers of the second-level should be able to provide performance-feedback. The emphasis begins to shift slowly towards the importance of mentorship and away from purely focusing on processes.

- Leading managers to functional manager
The key to becoming a functional manager is developing the leader’s communication skills further.
Furthermore, functional managers are required to widen their understanding of the organization beyond just the tasks and performances they need to manage. Since the functional manager will be dealing with other managers, they must be good at understanding the different needs in a variety areas of the organization – in essence, the skill of “seeing the big picture” becomes increasingly important.
The main skills that need developing at this point are: the ability to be a part of the team (i.e. communication) and understanding the needs and concerns of others. The functional manager must be able to compete for resources, while maintaining the operational needs of the business at the centre. The development needs to start focusing more on the strategic abilities of the person and enhance his or her ability to delegate tasks to other managers and employees.
The emphasis becomes on focusing on long-term strategy AKA “managerial maturity”. This is described as an ability to create a functional strategy, which “enables them to do something better than the competition”. The functional manager is able to look beyond the current moment and devise strategies that give the organization a competitive edge in the long-term.

- Functional manager to business manager
A business manager will need to be able to perform under bigger pressure, as the autonomy to make decisions expands further. The fourth level is an important shift in the leadership pipeline model since the skills start shifting from being able to manage to being able to lead. The passage is not just about being able to think strategically and improving your ability to allocate time and resources. The step to becoming a business manager requires deeper understanding of functionality and its influence to profits.
The development focus should turn to improving the manager’s ability to work, inspire and control different teams. The manager must become skilled at understanding how different people operate and improve his or her abilities to understand employees at an emotional level. The ability to understand emotional intelligence should be at the heart of the development process. Furthermore, the focus should not be just on the ability to manage different people, the business manager must also understand how different functions operate together.
The emphasis must be on the strategic trade-off between future goals and the present needs of the organization. The manager can’t just ensure things are working smoothly, but he or she must be able to meet the financial requirements and needs. This means understanding how current functionality will influence the profits in the future.
Instead of allocating time and resources, the business manager will spend most of his or her time reflecting and analyzing the past, present and future performance. “business managers must learn to trust, accept advice, and receive feedback from all functional managers, even though they may never have experienced these functions personally.”

- Business manager to group manager
While a business manager will continue to focus on his or her team’s achievements, a group manager takes satisfaction from the success of others. The passage is about discovering those people who are able to support and encourage other managers to excel, instead of focusing on being perfect themselves.
The passage requires the development of the four skills. First, the emphasis should be on evaluation skills and devising strategy, which appropriately focuses on capital allocation and deployment. This is about the ability to analyze and identify the right data, as well as the application of the right corporate strategies in any given situation.
The second skill involves the development of other managers. Although mentoring is important in all the previous passages, the ability to identify and support the right talent becomes crucial at this part of the pipeline model. For the third skill, the group manager must be able to start looking at the broader business needs, in terms of expanding and growing the operational aspects of the business.
A group manager must be able to consider new ventures and the discarding of old operations if they aren’t supporting the profits of the organization. Finally, group managers must become better at self-actualization. Leadership becomes a holistic practice at this point. The holistic leader has to “evolve their perspective to the point that they see issues in the broadest possible terms”.

- Group manager to enterprise manager
The emphasis at this point becomes almost solely value- rather than skill-based. The leader’s abilities should already have been proven in terms of the technical abilities.
From now on, the leader must be able to highlight the values behind their leadership strategy and success. The role of an enterprise manager becomes more about the long-term vision, although there is still some need for maintaining the short-term functionality. Above all, the final passage leaders have to become outward looking in their approach to leadership.
The development of the final stage leaders must emphasize visionary rather than strategic thinking. At this level, leaders must be able to think big and see the road ahead, even when it hasn’t been made yet. The leader has to learn to focus on the whole, instead of the individual pieces that make up the organization. Micromanagement is not something an enterprise manager should be concerned with.
Since the leader in the final passage will be in charge of the whole organization, the ability to inspire and motivate are crucial. The leader has to be able to communicate the vision clearly.

BUILDING BLOCKS OF SUCCESSFUL LEADERSHIP PIPELINE

- A simple system with buy-in from the senior leadership team
- Focus on development
- Assess and identify potential
- Keep succession planning transparent

I feel truly ambivalent about this book, but on balance net positive.

The pros: it's actually a really thorough analysis of how to think about leadership, management, and problems therein that pop up across companies. And it provides reasonable, real world courses of action that remedy common leadership and management problems. The authors are aware of the limitations of their framework: they acknowledge some companies will combine layers, and not everyone is the same, but they separate all the layers and skills for greater clarity.

The cons: it's written in anodyne corporate-ese, which both hinders the clarity of the ideas and reduces the authors' credibility (it makes them seem less genuine). They're about as inspiring as the consultants in Office Space.

One of the most practical books on leadership, the transitions that need to happen in a person career, and that the real differences are in the levels of leadership. The last one can always seem like the most difficult to understand, besides the power it confers - but this book breaks it down in a very succinct manner. Very useful.

Definitely a reference book. Boils down to - if in times of crisis your employees do the work of their direct reports (ICs or managers) you have leadership issues.

"Output will be inappropriate unless the incumbent values the right work; unless there is a process in place to identify what the right work is for the right leadership position; and measures are in place to determine whether the right work is being done."

"A common organizational mindset is to view jobs as work to be done and not as developmental assignments."

"Skill requirements - the new capabilities required to execute new responsibilities.
Time applications - time frames that govern how one works.
Work values - what people believe is important and so become the focus of their effort."

"Ways you can keep tabs on whether a given manager is making a successful transition, including the following:
Observation: Sit in on a first line manager's interactions with their direct reports...
Sampling: 360 degree feedback that assess for [appropriate level attributes]
Gap analysis: Question first line managers about their perceptions of their skills, time applications, and values. Contrast their answers with information received from observation and sampling and make them aware of the gap between the two."

"There is a disturbing emerging trend: creating many manager of others positions with only a few direct reports as a reward for good performance. There isn't enough work to occupy this new manager's time. As a result, they don't really learn how to manage. They carry the manager title but don't learn to value or execute managerial work. Although they still expect to be promoted to the next layer, they aren't prepared for it."

"People decide how to fill their own work hours based on their own value systems, as well as the company's values. Contrary to popular belief time isn't allocated based on a boss's directives but as what the individual views as valuable work."

"Not addressing these gaps immediately when someone is promoted to a new leadership position lets everyone know that the organization doesn't deem leadership as particularly important."

"Potential means the work one can do in the future....
Turn potential: Should be able to do the work [at the next pipeline level] in the next 3-5 years
Growth potential: Able to do a bigger job at the same level in 3-5 years
Mastery: can continue to grow capability in the current or a similar position."

"1: Tell me about your career, your jobs, the work you did, your achievements, key challenges, and learning.
Purpose: locate the positions this person has held on the pipeline. Has she skipped a level? Has she mastered each level's skills, time applications, and values?
2: Talk about your current position. What are your issues challenges and achievements? What does your calendar look like? What skills do you rely on most to get the job done? What beliefs govern your work?
Purpose: Determine whether this person understands and is mastering the appropriate skills, time applications and values for his level or whether the person is just beginning to get there. Assess whether their are obvious developmental needs based responses and objective information such as a supervisor's perspective, 360 degree feedback and so on.
3: What are your career aspirations?
Purpose: Identify future development needs given this person's current state and the leadership level to which the person aspires. Suggest types of experiences that will help achieve this level. Based on the answers to one and two convey your sense of how realistic making the next leadership passage might be."

"Making the coachee feel better is not a valid outcome."

"right individuals in place to do the work, job well defined - first line managers, enterprise functional managers
individual contributors trained properly - first line managers
coaching and feedback improving performance, rewards appropriate and timely - first line managers taught by manager of managers
work properly connected between the function and the rest of the business - manager of managers
appropriate state of the art technology used as part of the strategy - functional manager
clear business strategy properly communicated for right motivation, appropriate resources available - business manager
likely future requirements of the function made clear - group functional managers
appropriate standards used, including role in immune system that protects the company - enterprise functional manager"

This book was extremely helpful. While it is focused on a corporate business context, it has proven to be extremely transferrable to a church context. Good stuff.

If you only read one book about leadership talent planning, this is it. Classic and excellent book on how to look at the skills, time application and values needed for different levels of leadership. Following this can help develop talent, and avoid confusion and frustration.

3.5 stars. Really dry, but very relevant to my new role and the challenges I’m facing. Would recommend only to those working in or interested in people strategy and talent development (including your own).