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Award-winning consulting.

Leadership principles are meant to give direction, clarify responsibilities and make shared, consistent leadership tangible in everyday work.

In many organisations the reality looks different: fine-sounding sentences appear on posters and on the intranet, while employees experience leadership in practice as something entirely different. There is often a gap between aspiration and reality - and managers feel left alone. The “leadership principles project” stays a paper tiger and leaves cynicism behind.

Our consulting on developing and introducing leadership principles starts considerably deeper:

• with a diagnosis of the existing leadership culture,
• with the participation of the relevant groups,
• with embedding them in the “operating system” of the organisation
• and with developing indicators to measure their effect

What you get from us is a comprehensive consulting approach: Well-founded, tested in practice and with a clear focus on lasting implementation.

Why Clear Leadership Principles Matter More Than Ever.

Clear leadership principles serve several functions:

• Direction in complex situations Principles give managers a frame of reference for decisions, particularly in dilemmas (e.g. results versus care for people, speed versus thoroughness, autonomy versus control).
• Coherence across levels and divisions They reduce the element of chance in leadership and align expectations between the executive board, middle management and teams.
• Reliability for employees People can see which leadership behaviour is wanted – and have a reference against which to check their own experience.
• Connection to strategy and employer appeal Leadership practice acts directly on innovation, quality, collaboration and the retention of key people. Principles are a strategic lever here.
• A basis for HR instruments They create a clear reference point for selecting, developing, giving feedback to and appraising managers.

Leadership principles are therefore part of a new “operating system” for strategy work, delivery and validation.

What We Mean by Effective Leadership Principles.

Leadership principles are more than a collection of abstract value terms. They become effective where they meet three conditions:

1. Action-oriented Principles describe expected behaviour concretely enough for managers and employees to derive decisions about how to act (“What do I do in situation X?”). General formulations such as “We communicate with appreciation” are not enough unless it is also described how that shows up in everyday work.
2. Observable and verifiable Good principles can be recognised in concrete situations: it is clear whether a behaviour meets the expectation or not. That makes feedback, reflection and, where necessary, consequences possible.
3. Linked to strategy and values Principles do not stand in isolation alongside the corporate mission statement, the strategy and the value system; they deliberately translate these into requirements for leadership. That makes them the link between “paper” and everyday practice.

At the same time it makes sense to distinguish leadership principles from neighbouring formats:

• A leadership mission statement describes the overarching frame of reference (“How do we understand good leadership in this organisation?”).
• Leadership principles translate that frame into concrete expectations for deciding, steering, communicating, developing people and confronting.
• Code of Conduct / compliance rules set legal and ethical minimum standards.

In practice these levels complement one another. Leadership principles take on the role of an operational steering instrument.

Why So Many Sets of Leadership Principles Fail to Have an Effect.

Many organisations do formally have leadership principles – and yet these have hardly any effect.

Four patterns show up again and again in initiatives that fail:

3.1 Say-do gap: the gap between aspiration and behaviour

There is a visible gap between what is officially proclaimed and what managers actually do. This say-do gap arises, for example, when:

• principles do not match the real incentive systems (e.g. pressure on short-term figures versus an officially stated focus on people),
• visible role models in top management do not visibly live by their own principles,
• employees conclude, after critical experiences, that principles are communicated but ignored when it matters.

The result is cynicism, a loss of trust and a declining willingness to engage with new initiatives.

3.2 Principles formulated top-down, with no ownership

Principles are formulated in a small circle in senior management or in the communications department and then “rolled out”. What remains in the organisation, though, is the feeling that something has been imposed that has little to do with day-to-day leadership:

• Hardly anyone identifies with the content.
• Contradictions and everyday difficulties are never named.
• Principles are seen as a formal exercise, not as “our project”.

3.3 Missing or incomplete top-management commitment

Formal commitment (“We stand behind this”) is not enough to change behaviour. Commitment becomes effective only when several dimensions come together, for example:

• Communication: the top of the organisation puts the principles on the agenda again and again as an important topic.
• Involvement: senior leaders take a visible part in workshops, discussions and decisions.
• Support: time, resources and priority are made available.
• Empowerment: managers and employees are given room to try new things.
• Encouragement: the behaviour that is wanted is recognised.
• Monitoring: there are mechanisms for observing progress and deviations.

Without the necessary anchoring at C-level, such initiatives often “peter out”.

3.4 Cultural resistance and structural inertia

Leadership principles operate inside existing cultures and structures:

• unspoken norms (“That’s how it’s done here”),
• divisional boundaries and silo logic,
• entrenched routines in meetings, decision paths and role expectations,
• formal structures that make the wanted behaviour harder (e.g. obstacles in the organisational structure, unclear responsibilities, contradictory objectives).

Anyone who does not address these factors explicitly risks introducing principles “against” the existing system – and will fail.

Effective consulting therefore takes these four levels seriously and designs the process so that the say-do gap, ownership, top-management commitment and fit with the system are considered from the start.

Typical Starting Situations in Organisations.

A few recurring starting constellations can be observed in projects:

• No principles at all Leadership depends heavily on the individual, differences between divisions and locations are large, and conflicts often escalate to a personal level.
• Principles exist but are not lived There is a document that was presented at workshops and events but plays hardly any role day to day. Some employees do not know what it says.
• Principles are too abstract or too extensive Long lists of generic terms (“respect”, “openness”, “transparency”) offer little direction in concrete situations. Managers tend to follow informal patterns instead.
• Pressure to change with no clear picture of leadership Organisations that are growing, reorganising or emerging from a merger notice that the leadership culture they have is no longer sufficient. What is missing is a shared idea of what leadership should look like in future.

In all these constellations leadership principles can be an effective instrument – provided they are developed professionally, tied into the existing system and not treated as an isolated action.

Our Consulting Approach: Leadership Principles as Part of the Organisational “Operating System”.

The consulting approach outlined here treats leadership principles as part of the organisational operating system and combines four elements:

1. a well-founded diagnosis of the culture as it is,
2. participative, co-creative development of the principles,
3. translation into structures, processes, leadership routines and HR instruments,
4. support as a change project, including measurement of its effect.

Phase 0 – Diagnosis of the current culture and of the expectations of leadership

It starts with a clear picture of the situation as it stands:

• analysis of existing documents (mission statement, strategy, HR instruments, any principles already in place),
• interviews or focus groups with managers and employees,
• where appropriate, standardised culture diagnostics, surveys or pulse checks.

The aim is to make patterns visible:

• Where is leadership experienced as coherent, where as problematic?
• Which unspoken rules shape behaviour?
• Which competing demands do managers experience day to day?

This diagnosis creates a sound basis for the development that follows.

Phase 1 – Co-creative development of the leadership principles

In a second step the principles are developed in dialogue-based formats:

• workshops with managers and selected employees,
• work with concrete stories from everyday life (“storytelling”),
• condensing these examples into thematic clusters (e.g. deciding, collaboration, conflict, a learning culture that is learning from its mistakes, developing people).

Important principles:

• Participation instead of decree: principles are not presented as a finished product; they are worked out together.
• Grounded language: the wording follows the language the organisation actually uses.
• Dilemma test: the principles are checked for whether they really do give direction in critical situations.

Phase 2 – Translation into the organisation’s operating system

Principles have an effect when they are linked to existing steering mechanisms. This includes in particular:

• Integration into HR processes objective-setting and appraisal systems, criteria for promotion and succession planning, requirement profiles for leadership positions, onboarding of new managers.
• Adjusting committees and decision paths clarifying in which bodies the implementation is reviewed; embedding it in management retreats and heads-of-division meetings.
• Connection to communication processes consistent use of the principles in internal communication, good-practice examples to illustrate them.

Without this anchoring, principles compete with existing routines and lose significance.

Phase 3 – Qualification, change management and transfer support

Introducing leadership principles is a change process and should be designed professionally. Established change models that cover both structural and individual aspects can serve as the basis.

Typical elements:

• leadership training based on the principles (e.g. feedback, conflict conversations, decision processes),
• team workshops in which managers and employees clarify together what the principles mean concretely for their area,
• accompanying communication that makes progress and challenges visible,
• formats for reflection in day-to-day leadership (e.g. short slots in regular meetings in which current cases are held up against the principles).

New routines emerge step by step; the principles are woven into everyday work rather than grafted on “from outside”.

Example Roadmap: What a Project Can Look Like.

Scope and pace differ according to size and sector. A typical course could contain the following stages:

1. Clarifying the assignment and the design clarifying objectives, expectations, conditions and criteria for success; setting the participation formats and the project architecture.
2. Diagnosis phase (phase 0) interviews, focus groups and, where appropriate, a survey; evaluation and condensation into central patterns and topics.
3. Co-creative development (phase 1) workshops in several stages with managers and representatives of the relevant groups; drafting and revising the principles until a version is ready for approval.
4. Systemic anchoring (phase 2) alignment with HR, the works council or staff council and the relevant bodies; adjusting instruments and processes.
5. Qualification and transfer (phase 3) running training courses and team formats; accompanying communication; setting up feedback and reflection loops.
6. Review and further development an interim assessment after defined periods; adjusting the principles, instruments or forms of support on the basis of experience.

Quality Criteria for Good Leadership Principles.

From project experience and research a number of quality features can be derived against which principles can be measured:

• A limited number A manageable number of principles raises the likelihood that they will be remembered and applied.
• Clarity and comprehensibility The wording is precise, avoids unnecessary jargon and does without stock phrases that are open to interpretation.
• Behaviour orientation Principles describe not only attitudes (“We are open”) but make visible which behaviour is expected (“We respond to each other within X days”, “We raise conflicts before …”).
• Fit for dilemmas Principles help with conflicting objectives and provide criteria for decisions instead of merely repeating the obvious.
• Coherence with strategy and values There are no fundamental contradictions between strategy, corporate values and leadership principles.
• Anchoring in the system The principles reappear in objective agreements, appraisal criteria, selection processes and qualification programmes.
• Regular reflection There are agreed occasions on which the principles are reviewed together and adjusted where needed.

These criteria can already serve as a shared quality framework during the development phase.

Embedding Leadership Principles in the Organisation’s Operating System.

If leadership principles are to have a noticeable effect, they have to be translated into and built into systems, processes and routines (we also speak of the “organisational operating system”).

Relevant points of connection are, for example:

• Objective and performance management linking objectives with aspects of the leadership culture, including leadership behaviour in performance conversations.
• Recruiting and onboarding integrating the principles into requirement profiles and selection interviews; using the principles in the onboarding of new managers and key people.
• Career and succession processes taking the leadership behaviour people actually show into account in promotion decisions; clear signals that the principles matter when leadership roles are filled.
• Feedback and learning culture using the principles as a reference in employee and leadership feedback; establishing formats in which teams reflect together on how leadership is experienced.
• Organisational structures reviewing whether structures support or hinder the behaviour that is wanted; where necessary adjusting interfaces, decision paths or the logic of committees.

Only when principles become visible in mechanisms like these do they bring about lasting change in decisions, behaviour and priorities.

Measuring the Effect of Leadership Principles and Learning Together.

The effect of leadership principles cannot be captured entirely in numbers, but it can be observed and reflected on systematically.

One useful framework is the four-level model established in training practice:

1. Reaction How are the principles and the accompanying actions perceived? Examples: feedback from workshops, short surveys after training.
2. Learning What have managers and employees understood and taken on board? Examples: an assessment of whether the content and the expectations are clear; confidence in handling difficult situations.
3. Behaviour To what extent do leadership and collaboration actually change? Examples: 360° feedback, observations in day-to-day leadership, pulse surveys on how leadership is experienced.
4. Results Which effects show up at organisational level? Examples: turnover in key areas, engagement scores, internal escalation rates, the quality of interfaces.

On this basis we define clear, usable KPIs for measuring success.

Less is more here: a small framework of figures and observations beats complex constructs that no one uses day to day.

Examples from Our Consulting on Leadership Principles.

Here are a few typical examples from our consulting practice:

• A growing mid-sized company Different leadership styles collide and conflicts between old and new structures pile up. The principles are used to create a shared understanding of leadership and to integrate it into selection, appraisal and development conversations.
• Public sector Tensions between professional autonomy and hierarchical responsibility weigh on collaboration. The principles make decision and communication paths concrete and help people live up to their responsibilities more clearly.
• Post merger: Two cultures that have grown up separately are to come together. Leadership principles are used as a central element in developing a shared picture of leadership and integrating it into committee work, HR processes and communication.

These examples make it visible why our consulting approach works.

Further Building Blocks Around Leadership Principles.

Leadership principles rarely stand alone; they are embedded in wider development processes, for example:

• culture and change processes,
• strategy retreats and revisions of the mission statement,
• leadership programmes and curricula,
• team and divisional development,
• formats for establishing a feedback and learning culture.

A transparent picture of these connections helps to judge the scale of the project realistically and to see sensible combinations and follow-on steps.

Which Organisations Benefit Most from External Support.

External support can be particularly helpful

• where several attempts have already been made to introduce principles or mission statements and these were experienced as having little effect,
• where internal facilitation and change capacity is limited,
• where highly diverse stakeholder groups are involved (e.g. different professions, locations, divisions),
• where leadership has been identified as a strategic bottleneck and the ambition is not only to formulate principles but to embed them rigorously in the system.

The building blocks described here can be cut to size as modules and adapted to the specific situation of your organisation.

What a Next Step Towards Consulting Can Look Like.

If you would like to examine whether and how a project on leadership principles makes sense in your organisation, a first, clearly focused conversation with a small circle is a good place to start (e.g. the executive board or management, people development/organisational development and, where appropriate, one senior person who is central to the subject matter).

Such an exchange can clarify

• which objectives you associate with leadership principles,
• what experience your organisation has already had with similar projects,
• which conditions and constraints have to be taken into account,
• and which shape of approach looks plausible for your situation.

On this basis a project proposal can emerge that fits the size, the culture and the strategic position of your organisation.

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