EXECUTIVE CAREER PLANNING: A LOST PRACTICE

July 2002

Tom is a 48 year old general manager of a global business unit for a billion dollar health care organization. He is an operational wizard. He had responsibly turned around several business units that were losing profitability due to operational inefficiencies. Based on his stellar track record, he was given a new kind of assignment, to define the strategic direction for one of these turn-around businesses that would be facing some very challenging marketplace conditions in the next 2-3 years.

It sounded like a great opportunity….. but there was one major problem: Strategic business development was not his strength, nor was it something that Tom honestly wanted to cultivate to be his strength. He loved fixing businesses, not launching them.

Not surprisingly, this assignment did not go well. Tom worked hard, never admitting to anyone how much he disliked the assignment. As time passed, the work became less even less gratifying and successful. Based on some 360 degree feedback, it became painfully clear Tom’s team was not getting the kind of leadership they wanted and needed. Tom became even more dejected.

To show his commitment to improving his performance, Tom recruited an executive coach. His goal for the coaching was to learn how to be more effective in a role he hated. His coach had a better idea. She suggested adjusting his current role and team assignments so that his weaknesses would be delimited but the business task would be accomplished. For example, he delegated more responsibilities to team members who were specifically looking for development in the areas that he found particularly challenging and then used the team more regularly to critique and improve upon their overall progress.

She also recommended that Tom immediately work to identify exactly what he wanted to contribute, experience, and learn during future career assignments. And to work with his boss on getting only those assignments that would suit his skills set and better match his interests.

At first, Tom was unsure about value of developing a career plan at this stage of his work life. He was already a business executive, a leader of people. How much more specific did he need to be? Not to mention the fact that he believed that, as a member of the senior leadership team, he had a responsibility to accept every executive assignment. His boss had in fact lobbied hard for Tom to take this particular role. Backed by the recommendation of the organization’s executive succession planning team, his boss had

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