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Shaping Tomorrow

What the Experts Are Saying

There is a looming crisis in leadership and management in the United States. Here is what some prominent people in the field are saying.

Ram Charan, highly acclaimed speaker and advisor to some of America’s most prominent CEOs, states that:

“Crisis may be an overused word, but it’s a fair description of the state of leadership in today’s corporations. CEO’s are failing sooner and falling harder, leaving their companies in turmoil. At all levels, companies are short on the quantity and quality of leaders they need.”

Ram Charan,
“Leaders At All Levels”
2008, p. 1 

 

“the CEO succession process is broken in North America and is no better in many other parts of the world”

Ram Charan
“Ending the CEO Succession Crisis"
Harvard Business Review
February 2005, p. 1

According to an article by Ephraim Schwartz in Infoworld:

“Five hundred of the largest companies can expect to lose 50 percent of their senior management in [the coming years],
and 40% of companies don’t have a leadership succession plan.”

Ephraim Schwartz
InfoWorld
March 6, 2006, p. 12

In a survey done by IBM, Eric Lesser says,

“Companies are really crunched both in terms of their current capacity of leadership and also their ability to develop leaders in the future. Three-quarters of the people who responded said this was a significant workplace issue."

"Companies Face Looming Leadership Crisis"
IBM Study
Reuters, Thu Oct. 18, 2007

 

“Over the past decade, Gallup has surveyed more than 10 million people worldwide on the topic of employee engagement (or how positive and productive people are at work), and only one-third “strongly agree” with the statement: “At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day.” And for those who do not get to focus on what they do best – their strengths – the costs are staggering. In a recent poll of more than 1,000 people, among those who “strongly disagreed” or “disagreed” with this “what I do best” statement, not one single person was emotionally engaged on the job. In stark contrast, our studies indicate that people who do have the opportunity to focus on their strengths every day are six times as likely to be engaged in their jobs and more than three times as likely to report having an excellent quality of life in general.”

Strengthsfinder 2.0
Tom Rath
pg. ii

 

Governing magazine reports that as baby boomers retire, the knowledge and experience necessary to conduct government is going out the door with them.

Christopher Cone
“Expert Exodus,” Governing
February 2006

 

Warns Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao,

“the looming retirement of so many baby boomers is a seismic event that will affect our workforce in profound ways”

Mary Grayson
Hospitals & Health Networks
November 2005, p. 6

 

As an example, MIT professor David DeLong says that NASA would have to start from scratch to conduct a moon landing because those on the original team have all retired or passed away.

Jennifer J Salopek
Training and Development
June 2005, p. 23

 
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