A business improvement tool to help organisations build an effective leadership structure and culture

Leadership is typically viewed from the point of view of the skills of individual leaders. But this Audit uses a distinctive, new model to help you analyse the way your organisation promotes, sustains, encourages or inhibits leadership right across the business. It looks at leadership as an organisational resource and shows how organisations need to provide a shared, honest and valid purpose, develop a conscious, supportive leadership culture, create a leadership structure that works, and remove obstacles to individual leadership.

The audit has six distinctive themes:

• 1. Responding to the new environment. Look at the implications for organisational leadership of the changing business environment - political, social, legal, political, technological, ethical, ecological, etc. Examine stakeholder expectations and pressures, as well as the changing demands for, and expectations of, leadership in the new environment.
• 2. Mapping the organisation context. Find out where the ‘internal organisation’ needs to be headed in order to serve the needs of the business. How well are leadership resources matched to the challenge of internal change?
• 3. Challenging the leadership culture. Look at the existing leadership culture (‘what leadership is like round here’) and find where it is dysfunctional in serving the organisation's goals.
• 4. Attaining leadership competence. How well are leadership competencies used to add value to the organisation?
• 5. Managing leadership across the employment spectrum. How does the HR function ‘manage’ leadership talent?
• 6. Supervising leadership development. Consider the nature and quality of the connection between those responsible for overall business strategy and those charged with the development of leadership and HR management.