Leadership Capability: Your Most Underestimated Competitive Advantage

23 Sept

Written By QFVG

For growers and agricultural businesses, managing risk is part of doing business. There are systems for workplace health and safety, processes for payroll and employment compliance, procedures for food safety and quality, and plans for managing everything from biosecurity to machinery and production.

We put these controls in place because getting them wrong can have significant consequences.

But there is another area of business risk, and opportunity, that is often far less structured. In many businesses, supervisors and managers have worked their way into leadership because they are good at what they do. They know the operation. They understand production. They can solve problems and get things done.

But being technically capable and being capable of leading people are two different things.

Suddenly, that great operator, grower or team member is expected to manage performance, navigate conflict, give feedback, motivate a diverse workforce, lead through change and have difficult conversations. And we often expect them to learn how to do it on the job.

Too often, development happens reactively. A supervisor attends training because they're struggling with their team. A manager receives coaching after a difficult period. Leadership development begins after turnover increases, conflict emerges or performance becomes an issue.

There is another way to approach it: build the capability before you need it.

That means thinking about what your business will require from its leaders over the next few years and providing the proactive development to help them get there.

Great leadership shows up every day and has a massive impact on your team members, and your business. When a supervisor notices tension in a crew and addresses it early. How a manager responds when an employee makes a mistake. Whether expectations are clear. How good performance is recognised and underperformance is addressed. These are everyday leadership behaviours that influence retention, productivity, engagement, safety, performance and workplace culture.

The businesses building strong leadership capability aren't necessarily finding ready-made leaders. They're deliberately developing them.

What is your leadership capability plan?

Beyond a list of courses for managers to attend…what leadership capability will your business need over the next three to five years and what are we doing now to build it?

Because while compliance helps protect today's business, leadership capability helps build tomorrow's.

Start a conversation with the Focus HR team about building the leadership capability your business will need for the future. Reach out via the QFVG workplace relations support line at wrteam@qfvgcom.au or 07 3620 3844.