The Performance Pipeline

About the Author

Stephen Drotter is a distinguished leader in the field of human resources and leadership development. With a career spanning over 40 years, Drotter has worked with more than 100 companies worldwide, providing deep insights into organizational performance and leadership transitions. He played a crucial role in designing GE's succession planning process and held significant positions in human resources at INA Corp. and Chase Manhattan. Drotter is also the co-author of the best-selling book The Leadership Pipeline and The Succession Planning Handbook for the Chief Executive.

Main Idea

In The Performance Pipeline, Stephen Drotter presents a comprehensive framework for understanding and improving performance at every level of leadership within an organization. The book delves into how work flows from the top to the bottom of an organization and what results each layer must produce to ensure overall success. Drotter emphasizes the importance of defining the unique purpose of each leadership layer and providing clarity and focus on the results to be achieved. His method, known as the Performance Pipeline, is designed to be flexible and applicable to organizations of any size and industry.

Table of Contents

1. The Performance Pipeline Concept
2. Defining Your Performance Pipeline
3. Expected Results at Every Level of Leadership
4. Enterprise Chief Executive Officer: Perpetuate the Enterprise
5. Group Managers: Portfolio of Businesses
6. Business Managers: Short-Term and Long-Term Profit
7. Function Managers: Competitive Advantage
8. Managers of Managers: Productivity
9. Managers of Others: The Enablers
10. Self-Managers: Delivering the Products and Services
11. Successful Implementation of the Performance Pipeline
12. Enabling Layer Transitions
13. Implementing Your Performance Pipeline

The Performance Pipeline Concept

The concept of the Performance Pipeline revolves around four key imperatives that are crucial for leaders to address in today's dynamic business environment:

• Every leader must spend 30 minutes to one hour or more daily in uninterrupted thought.
• Everyone must innovate as a natural and expected part of their daily routine.
• Leaders must provide true role clarity and purpose for every employee.
• Leaders must create an environment where sufficient focus is achievable.

According to Drotter, to respond to these imperatives, organizations do not need an expensive change management program or a new CEO. Instead, they require a top-to-bottom architecture that distributes accountability by layer and defines how work flows down to the appropriate layer. This architecture, known as the Performance Pipeline, helps leaders increase think time, encourage innovation, provide clarity, and enable focus.

The Performance Pipeline is based on the following ideas:

• Every layer has a unique purpose.
• Every layer delivers unique results.
• Every layer contributes to the success of the layer below.

The Performance Pipeline is the starting point for leadership development and enables delivering the right results in the right way at the right time.

Defining Your Performance Pipeline

The process of defining your Performance Pipeline consists of six steps: