The Dawn of HR Metrics
Serious management publications are drawing attention to the commercial potential in an evolving discipline within business science—the study of HR Metrics. “Talent-Metrics” features are appearing in venerable publications, including the McKinsey Quarterly and the Harvard Business Review. It is suggested, for example, that shifting business focus and investment thinking more towards people and talent attributes as precursors to business outcomes creates better strategic business prioritization, often against the tide of capital investment ratios and traditional economic logic.

This compelling proposition was featured in a recent Harvard Business Review article, March 2007, entitled “Maximizing Your Return on People” where five Human Capital Drivers are proposed. In all, 23 Human Capital Management Practices are recommended, five of which are Leadership. While these concepts feed the flames of debate, practitioners are drawn to the measures that really matter. Herethe authors Laurie Bassi and Daniel McMurrer get beneath the rhetoric with robust research. They show that organizations’ levels of maturity in HCM practices can affect sales and safety levels.

Executive Talent is the Multiplier
However before we set sail on the good ship Talent Excellence somebody has to ask the proverbial “Emperor’s New Clothes” question: Which pieces of this exciting concept, if any, deserve our undivided attention? Is it the raw Talent Acquisition cloak, filtering and funneling the good and the great into
our businesses, or the more refined Talent Engagement tunic tuning us in to post-hire leadership and workplace behaviors, organizational corner by corner, people segment by segment?

Which day-to-day behaviors most powerfully engage and transform our hard-won, strategically positioned and committed people? Well, fifty years of management research cannot be far wrong. This of course perennially points to leaders and leadership as the transformational business lever—but how can we leverage this lever?

Enter Positive Psychology Spin
Recent developments in I/O Psychology, those of Positive Psychology, are pretty persuasive and genuine in providing more than a new giddy spin. It seems that many studies are demonstrating that strengths are the new goodness, the near elixir for our mighty missions—particularly executive leadership strengths in this case. No problem, we hear the gurus say, we just need to hire “super strength” and as much as we can muster.

Executive leaders with attributes so compelling, no less, that we are close to swooning in just their presence. Somewhere near to you another assessment specialist salivates at the prospect of researching systems to identify these Olympian-level leaders. The notion that nothing is too much; that is to say strengths, and more of it, are the business—the “bees’ knees.” They may be right, of course.

The Dark Side
However, just as we thought it safe to slip into “pools of positivity,” the dorsal fin of the “Dark Side” of leadership cuts across the bay. Most surprisingly perhaps, this is championed by another breed of very innovative executive personality assessment researchers and practitioners.

New and purposefully challenging questions, possibly fed by very public corporate and global scandals, have been raised.

For example, what if leadership talent is so powerful that too much strength could be a bad thing? Can executives ever be too talented—too strong indeed?

This increasingly popular theme was presented recently in an address to the British Psychological Society in UK (Adrian Furnham: “The Icarus Syndrome” 2007). Paralleling the work by the Hogans in the
US, he has now drawn attention to the notion that, just as intellectual functioning has to be optimal for business leaders (i.e., neither too little nor too much), then perhaps too much “strength” in personality may not be good for business. In fact his position, the Hogans’ research, and additional new thinking by the “Snakes in Suits” authors Babiak and Hare, suggest that too much personality may be worse than a bad thing. It may in fact be very dangerous, and yet difficult to detect.

As always these outcomes are not inevitable. They depend on the blend of other personality factors and of course context. Although Babiak and Hare suggest interestingly that the more fluid and fast-growth organizations of recent times actually attract extreme executive personalities, yet fail to adopt the usual controls that the more bureaucratic companies consider routine practice.

Executive leaders with attributes so compelling, no less, that we are close to swooning in just their presence.

To be fair they also mention the rare event that is the moment we encounter these extreme types. Though they suggest fast-change and growth companies are most vulnerable because these extreme types are drawn to this highly charged dynamic, and at the same time these companies tend to be the least drawn to the science and best practices for admitting extremes who fit this flow.

Extreme Executive Personality Solutions?
In balancing and rooting out these risks, several researchers and practitioners alike suggest that several traditional HR processes should come into play. Referencing previous work contexts where possible and deep tracking of biographical history has a part to play. Where possible—and the author respects these are often challenging to set up afford and sustain—Group Assessment Centers can single out extreme people who disrupt and disable rather than enable. Structured Interviews—Maybe there is much to be said for extreme types with strong values based in organizational cultures whose strength lies in repelling other extremes through unwritten, invisible and trusting bonds between the current leaders.

At Extreme Levels, Hogan, Furnham, Babiak and Hare’s Work Suggests:

• Courage is powerful in times of change and growth yet can become counter- productive. Recklessness is one major risk here; courage without humility— a high wire game.
• Charm/Charisma can conceal “love me no matter what” super-selfish narcissism. The magnetism of charisma may woo the moment and yet lead us to rue the day.
• Decisiveness may hide a dispassionate psychopath, incapable of remorse or  empathy. Attractive as it is, it can lead to expensive implementations after the leader has moved on.
• Awareness and intuition can lead to crippling paranoia or over-dramatic histrionics. The very strength in sensing under pressure can sense ghosts in the machine, or worse.
• Even enthusiasm can be volatile, leading to mood swings, tantrums and long sulks. The very essence of enthusiasm can be a short term buzz followed by a depressive period.
• Shrewdness can lead to mistrust and retaliatory tactics, often feeling mistreated. Similar to awareness, shrewdness can lead to massive mistrust in team dynamics.
• Focus at extremes creates passive aggression or resistance to change—closed  mindedness. The Nero Complex, fiddling as Rome burns, uses old rules amidst rapid change.
• Dutiful people at higher levels can be over dependent and indecisive during change. The Bull Elephant Leadership paradigm—loss of leadership direction and the tribe dies.

Yet to be seen are deeper empirical studies that provide inescapable evidence. What if extreme executive personality, properly balanced, is essential for fast growth? Maybe there is much to be said for extreme types with strong values based in organizational cultures whose strength lies in repelling other extremes through unwritten, invisible and trusting bonds between the current leaders.

References

• Babiak, P., & Hare, R.D. (2006). Snakes in Suits—Psychopaths at Work: Regan Books.
• Bassi, L., & McMurrer, D. (2007, March). Maximizing Your Return on People. Harvard Business Review, 85.
• Hogan Development Survey—http://www.hoganassessments.com.
• Trends in Talent Management—McKinsey Quarterly Review, Spring 2007. www.mckinseyquarterly.com.