The success, resilience, and longevity of any business today heavily relies on effective leadership. Modern organizations thrive because their leaders are not only adept at leading people, but also at mentoring and inspiring others, and planning towards business goals.
Not all people are inclined to be leaders, and there are also differences in how leaders lead. So it is important to assess individual differences, strengths and weaknesses, and skills and competencies in order to determine an employee’s leadership potential. This is where a good leadership assessment tool comes in.
What does a leadership assessment do?
Leadership assessment tools are used to identify leadership capabilities and potentials in employees in different domains. These tools help businesses address shortages in leadership, and identify employees who are able to take on leadership roles early in their careers. They can also provide information that can help your company develop leadership programs.
What should a leadership assessment tool measure?
Personality
The psychology of personality has been instrumental in understanding individual differences and their outcomes — including leadership traits. Several studies suggest that people who are perceived to be leader-like possess certain traits such as agreeableness and emotional stability. Therefore, assessing both leadership potential and personality traits must go hand in hand.
Approach
It is important to know how a candidate approaches a problem — are they more people-oriented or task-oriented? How are they likely to react to challenging situations? And what would be the best way to communicate with them? A leadership assessment tool must measure observable behavior such as these, as this will help predict future behaviors.
Motivation
Assessing a leader or a candidate’s top motivators, passions, and interests can help determine what situations and activities energize them, and which ones would likely demotivate them. This way, employers and leaders themselves are able to understand why they do what they do, how they can provide value to their organization, and how their interests and talents can benefit their team and company.
Skills
The ability to solve problems, plan, and persuade are important skills to look for in a leader. Your leadership assessment tool must cover these. It should measure whether a candidate is able to address complex situations and conflicts, set goals and identify objectives, and build and motivate teams. In addition, your assessment must also cover other aspects such as linguistic, spatial, numerical, and error correction, depending on the needs of your business.
Style
You are looking for a leader whose style fits or complements the culture that you have established in your organization. This is why it is important that your leadership assessment measures this, as well. If your company is generally laid back, perhaps a candidate with an authoritarian leadership style might have a hard time adapting and thriving.
Bottomline
Whether you are hiring and developing new leaders, or helping the current ones assess themselves, a good leadership assessment tool can aid in providing a clear picture of their leadership potential, strengths, and weaknesses. The data gathered can help your company evaluate candidates for leadership positions and develop future leaders.
