Leadership for organisation development

Stated simply, organisational development (or OD for those in the know) is the work done to help organisations improve efficiency and effectiveness.

It usually involves understanding the strategy, practices and systems that affect the effectiveness, potential and capacity of both people and organisations.

Presenting to Queensland public sector program leaders and executives, Robin Ryde—author, consultant and director of ANZSOG's Executive Fellows Program—says there are three considerations we can all use, to reshape our current thinking on leadership to really drive organisational change.

1. Good leaders must be able to focus on the craft of leading people— the 'how' as well as the 'content' or the direction that they are leading people to.

   In the language of the Leadership competencies for Queensland, a high performing leader will possess the leadership quality of inspiring others with a vision of direction, as well as having the ability to get them there.

2. Focus needs to shift away from the leader as a singular person and move towards a focus of leadership as a system of influence. This includes understanding the impact of external factors, such as organisational culture, motivation, and available resources.

   A good leader will demonstrate the competency of leading strategically, by being able to think critically and act on the broader purpose of the system around them.

3. We should shift our leadership focus from the methods and challenges that we've already analysed (déjà vu) to those that we haven't thought about yet (vu jàdé).

This means that good leaders must possess the competency of developing and mobilising talent, utilising the skills and knowledge of their team when identifying and adapting to new challenges.

If you would like to develop your leadership capability in the Queensland public sector:

• use the Leadership competencies for Queensland to identify the skills and behaviours you need to be a leader
• complete a competencies self-evaluation
• sign up to receive Public Service Commission updates and learning and development invitations
• find upcoming whole-of-government leadership events
• check out more articles like this.

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Last updated:

1 July 2022