A question that is difficult to answer is, “What is leadership?" and an even tougher question is, “How do you measure Leadership?" I believe you can measure leadership.

Let's consider a typical performance management process on a scale of 1-5 where the person is:

Exceptional – Someone performing and exceeding their objectives
Very Good - Someone performing and exceeding some of their objectives
Good – Steady, meets objectives
Poor – Someone underperforming
Very poor – Someone identified as consistently underperforming and requires an intervention

Organisations tend to look towards the people at (1) and (2) for promotion and the much coveted place at the 'Leadership Table'. But what if we were to look at Leadership attributes separately and use a different process for identifying future leaders within the organisation – a model based on four contributions or simply known as the 4 Cs.

The 4 Cs

Imagine that we have assessed our people using the criteria above – based on their current performance – and now we will ask the four key questions that will assess them on Leadership…

1. What is your contribution to the business?

This is the day job – what we do at an operational level. For example, a car salesman's target might be to sell 15 cars a month and if they sell 25 it is undoubtedly the case that they are making a significant contribution to the business.

This is important, but on its own it is not leadership. People who work in this space might be rewarded with a pay rise and a bonus, but just working on the day-to-day operations is not enough to get a place at the Leadership table – for that we must look at the other contributions you are making.

2.What is your contribution to your Self-development?

The world is changing and your business / organisation is changing. How are you developing yourself? Are you attending the appropriate training programmes, reading relevant articles, joining project teams that will help develop new skills?

Are you in tune with the organisation you work in and the changing profile of the marketplace? It is important for leaders to upskill themselves –if the business turns in a new direction you should be ready for it.

3.What is your contribution to the development of others?

Leadership is about engaging people to deliver the organisation's strategy. Ask yourself do you provide coaching or mentoring to others in the business? Do you share knowledge with other teams? Do you have a peer group support network?

If no one is contributing to the development of others then how will the team and the organisation grow.

4.What is your contribution to the wider business?

So far so good – you may have passed the above and cleared all three 'hurdles'. This is where most people stumble. Do you bring in processes and systems that work just for your team or do you work towards organisational improvement whenever possible?

Can you connect the dots – do you know the implications of carrying out an action and how that may impact other teams such as Finance and HR? Can you see the big picture and work towards that, or do you remain in your silo?

This contribution is about taking the time out to work in this space and can be challenging for people –if you aren't doing this then who is?

What are the advantages of applying this model?

It requires evidence – Each of the areas requires evidence. For example: 1. Contribution to the business - This could be sales figures, exceeding targets, etc. 2. Contribution to self-development - This could be programmes attended, CPD hours, written feedback from others on how you have applied the skills 3. Contribution to the development of others – Written feedback, hours spent coaching 4. Contribution to the wider business – Written feedback from the leadership team, innovation, evidence of working in cross-functional team projects.

It can be measured –We could add some metrics to the evidence – For example someone contributes 60 hours a year on coaching others – Feedback from the coachees could be measured on a scale of 1 10. For example on a scale of 1-10 (1 being poor – 10 being excellent) how effective was the coaching, did it help you do your job more effectively, etc.

The onus is on the potential leader to work towards the model – The responsibility for working towards the Four Cs, gathering the evidence, identifying the opportunities, etc. does not fall on the leader – it sits with the individual. The role of the leaders is to guide, advise, challenge and check progress during your regular performance management reviews.

It's not all about day to day operations – The model helps people understand that coming in each day, turning the machines on, processing something, flicking the switch off and going home is not leadership, and more than likely won't lead to the growth of the people and the organisation.

It's not just for current leaders – it's for everyone. You will want to identify future leaders and prepare them for Leadership so when they come to the table they are thinking strategically, developing others, etc – and it's not new to them.

I believe this model gets to the core of what leadership is and how we can measure it. It's not easy to apply, but who said leadership was easy.

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