Aon Hewitt recently announced DHL Express,
Lion and Z Energy as the 2014 Aon Hewitt Top Companies for Leaders in Australia and New Zealand.
The accolade recognises excellence in identifying and nurturing leadership talent.
“A new normal now exists. Leadership practices that used to differentiate are now commonplace within Australia and New Zealand,” said James Rutherford, principal and head of leadership at Aon Hewitt. “However, a new benchmark has now been set by Aon Hewitt’s 2014 Top Companies – DHL, Lion and Z Energy. These Top Companies all exhibit highly effective practices that, combined with clear outcomes and measurement, ensure strong leaders are continuously coming up through the ranks.”
According to Aon Hewitt, Z Energy was named a Top Company because it embeds a positive leadership culture, provides leadership development opportunities and integrates leadership expectations into recruitment and induction processes.
Lion was recognised as a Top Company because of its success in developing authentic leaders, driving culture and engagement through them, and identifying future leaders to help them flourish.
DHL was praised for using leadership to promote diversity and inclusion, providing strong leadership development frameworks and creating and embedding leaders within the business.
“True authenticity requires courage and self-awareness,” said Stuart Irvine, CEO at Lion. “There’s no short cut, and it can’t be faked. Cultivating authentic leadership capability takes sustained investment and in our experience it’s worth the effort. We know that authentic leaders build highly engaged people, who in turn build high engagement with Lion, which has a direct link back to business results.”
1. Processes to outcomes
It is no longer about processes, policies or simply completing an activity or program. Top Companies consistently measure the effectiveness of such practices and hold their leaders accountable for the outcomes.
Ninety per cent of Top Companies hold leaders accountable for the promotion rate of high potentials, as opposed to 30% of other organisations.
2. Engagement measurement to developing engaging leaders
Almost all organisations now measure engagement. However, Top Companies have an increased focus on the selection, attraction and development of leaders who through their personality, sense of purpose, experience and behaviours create engagement in their organisations.
Sixty-five per cent of Top Companies hold leaders accountable for the engagement levels of Managers and Managers’ direct reports as opposed to 30% of other organisations.
3. Diversity to inclusion
Top Companies focus much more on the gathering of diverse perspectives and insights from both within their organisation and externally.
70% of Top Companies track gender diversity for successors to the CEO, compared to 43% of other organisations.
4. Accumulating followers to developing leaders
Top Companies believe that the primary role of leaders is to identify and nurture upcoming leaders.
An overwhelming majority – ninety-five per cent – of Top Companies use 360 degree feedback to assess how leaders are developing their talent compared to only half of other organisations.
5. Assessing skill to aligning for fit
Top Companies assess both the skills required for the future success of the organisation and the fit to the organisation’s aspired culture and strategy.
Three quarters of Top Companies use personality assessments to measure the potential of front line managers, compared to less than half of other organisations.
6. Higher performance to higher purpose
It’s not just about performance – Top Companies create a sense of higher purpose and look at how they contribute to the environment and how their strategy affects the communities in which they work.
Top Companies are twice as likely as other organisations to offer employees special assignments directly related to their CSR strategy.
