Written by three genuine experts in management development (one of them helped design GE's deservedly famous succession-development process), The Leadership Pipeline: How to Build the Leadership Powered Company finally shows organizations how to undo the knots and clogs in their in-house "leadership pipeline" so they can constantly groom the best people at every level to move up to the next rung of leadership. Not only do the authors identify the six transition phases, or "turns," of the pipeline--from self-manager (individual worker), first-line manager, and managers' manager to function manager, business manager, group manager and enterprise manager (the last essentially being a CEO)--they describe each with remarkable insight; these six levels of leadership growth, for example, exist at the base of every midsize or large organization regardless of how each structures its individual hierarchy. With each, they take care to point out both the new skills and values (there is a difference) one must acquire before making a turn, as well as how to measure whether someone has them before moving them along. They also show how to determine whether candidates are embodying those skills and values once they've made the transition, and how to groom them for the next level right from day one.

The result? Not just one potentially qualified in-house candidate for a top leadership position (the kind of dearth that forces companies to look outward for expensive and often short-lived leadership "stars"), but a whole generation of them, not to mention younger generations to succeed them.

The book includes sample scenarios (from both fictional and real-life organizations), definitions, checklists and charts that break down and illustrate its main points in every chapter. Though shrewd and straightforward on every page, The Leadership Pipeline isn't for anyone looking an easy, step-by-step, worksheet-guided quick fix to management development and succession planning. The authors stress that it takes some hard thinking for companies to determine what they really need from leaders at each level (and to figure out which individuals have the potential and desire to scale those levels). It requires serious homework to translate this book's excellent guidance into a plan for your own organization's pipeline.

That's a small price to pay, however, for a book with such uncommonly clear insight into what it takes to nurture and navigate the best leadership from right inside your own house. --Timothy Murphy

Product Description
Together, these authors have more first-hand experience in leadership development and succession planning than you're likely to find anywhere else. And here, they show companies how to create a pipeline of talent that will continuously fill their leadership needs-needs they may not even yet realize. The Leadership Pipeline delivers a proven framework for priming future leaders by planning for their development, coaching them, and measuring the results of those efforts. Moreover, the book presents a combination leadership-development/succession-planning program that ensures a steady line-up of leaders for every critical position within the company. It's an approach that bolsters the retention of intellectual capital as it eliminates the need to go outside for expensive "stars," who will probably jump ship before they reach their full potential anyway.

At a time when more and more companies are relying on headhunters to bring in leaders and management turnover is soaring among young talent, "growing your own" leaders is about to become a necessary core competence for the future. While almost everyone who is interested in the subject has read glossy articles about what General Electric does at its Crotonville facility, this book provides the core of the broader management process behind those articles.

The first part of the book focuses on six key transitions that help a leader develop. The second part shows you how to diagnose how individual leaders are doing, and how to help them make better progress.

The six transitions are:

from managing yourself to managing others

from managing others to managing managers

from managing managers to functional managing

from functional managing to business managing

from business managing to group managing

from group managing to enterprise managing.

At each transition, what the individual values and focuses on has to change dramatically. In organizations where this transition is not made explicit, you get almost all of the managers in the organization "stuck" doing things the wrong way, still looking from the perspective of their last job. That's the stuff that Dilbert and the Peter Principle are made of.

Although the book takes a large organization's point of view, in various places the points are translated into a small organizational context.

Based on my experience with leaders at all these levels, I certainly agree with the authors' points about the key challenges involved. I also think that their diagnostic methods are good. In most cases, the root cause for the problem lies further up in the organization with someone who is not focusing or working on helping managers develop.

The key weakness of the book is that in some elements the reader with limited business experience will still not be sure what to do. For example, the step from a functional manager to a business manager requires integrating all of the functions and perspectives in order to be successful. That is an enormous leap in knowledge, expertise, and experience. Although business school cases will help those with that experience, most managers will find it impossible to make the transition unless the business is very undemanding -- something that seldom happens any more.

My own experience suggests that basic learning has to be pursued throughout the organization that emphasizes skills like problem solving, locating and implementing the next generation of best practices, and developing a deep understanding of how to create superior business processes as the foundation for this kind of leadership development program. In advanced companies, you can add the concept of having people develop skills for innovating new business models. Then, this leadership development process can become truly powerful.

However you decide to go about it, the examples of setbacks and progress outlined in this excellent book will improve your ability to think about improving leadership in your organization. I urge you to read, consider, and apply what you learn.

After you have finished thinking about and using the book, I suggest that you also think about where else in your company you do not have a management process to do something important. For example, do you have a management process to keep you aligned with powerful trends beyond your control? Do you have a management process to create superior business models?

Be all the leader you can be!


A "clone" book of ideas and no reference to others   August 27, 2005
 12 out of 14 found this review helpful

Reading this 'leadership pipeline' I became really astonished of seeing here all the ideas of Elliott Jaques and Gillian Stamp (Bioss International) just copied with no reference to them. I keep wondering how can that be done. Jaques and Gillian Stamp has written for so many years about human capability and seven levels of work complexity that are clearly repeated in this book withouth no comment to them. Even the general themes are there, for example managing other, leader of leader, managing a business unit, managing a group of business unit. If you don't beleive me, just read Requisite Organization (Jaques) and previous ones, for example, and you will learn that Jaques' ideas are being developed for more than 30 years. So, better learn with the real creative people that has really done researches around the theme.


Not just for the top level execs.   January 5, 2001
 7 out of 12 found this review helpful

I am not a CEO and my company is not even close to the size of a Marriott or GE, but that does not matter, this book will help anyone (everyone) who takes the time to understand it. The concepts laid out by Mr. Drotter (et all) definitely will assist the "Big Players" in ways that they can not even imagine but it will also make a difference for those striving to move up the corporate ladder.

And for those working, starting, growing a Dot.com I would suggest reading this book, it may assist you in taking the next step UP in lieu of yet another side step.


One Part of The leadership / Organizational Puzzle   June 22, 2001
 7 out of 24 found this review helpful

Many of us have been on a quest to better understand / codify work designand leadership at different levels of complexity !!!

one of the early thinkers / researchers in this area was Walt Mahler. He past away in the last 18 months. His early work is the basis for leadership development at GE and the principles still hold today !!!

A new book call the Leadership Pipeline - ISBN 0-7879-5172-2 by Ram Charan, Steve Drotter and James Noel captures many of the principles about multi level leadership that Walt under covered 20 years ago - he is referenced at the beginning

For those trying to better understand work complexity , and select / develop leaders when making significant career changes -

leading managers who lead others, leading multiple functions and process, leading stand alone / sustainable P&L business unit etc. Global CEO

These descriptions here about how leading others changes are helpful .

There are some problems with the books description of work at each Level of Complexity ! Some are at the wrong level based on the research of Jaques, Van Clieaf, Billis, Stamp and others and some leadership turns ( big career changes ) don't capture the real difference in work / competencies that make the difference to shareholder value.

The authors dont describe what are the unique outputs / contribution at each level the way Van Clieaf's research does but focus more on how the managerial leadership role changes - which is important !!

they don't really capture how the role of resource management changes at each leadership level nor how the interface with customer / stakeholders by complexity level.

they also confuse the differences between

e-process - level 3 complexity e-commerce - level 4 complexity e-business - level 5 complexity e-industry - level 6 complexity

as it related to the internet.

with that said this is a good contribution to undertanding how work, leadership and leadership development and selection changes at different complexity levels


Dated and poorly editted   July 29, 2003
 5 out of 6 found this review helpful

I found the concepts described in this text to be dated and somewhat out of touch with the demands of today's flexible, high speed organization. While the concepts developed in the book are thought provoking, I found it very frustrating reading because each chapter is written independently and likely by different authors. The format and flow of each of the chapters describing the leadership transitions varies so much that it's hard to make comparisons from one level to the next. A compilation of the transitional indicators would have been valuable - there is one in the first chapter but not in any of the others. If you read it, plan on taking notes on each chapter so you can make sense of it in the end.