Analysing a Poor Performing IT Team at an International Retail Bank: Part 3

Part 3: Conclusions and Recommendations

Overall Conclusions

• It seems very clear that the wrong person was managing the IT team. This placed unfair stress on the job holder and was counter-productive for the organisation
• The culture of the group did not focus enough on the delivery of outcomes – this needed to be addressed with appropriate training
• There also seemed to be an issue over their reporting skills and how they explained what they do
• There were behavioural issues surfaced by the 360 that indicated an inappropriate tolerance of authoritarian behaviour, as well as tension between the different rater groups
• The 360 revealed that senior management were aware of many of these problems but were not able to address them or chose not to address them

Key Recommendations

• So, who might have been better suited to lead the IT team? Using the LPA’s Role Profile utility, we determined that that the current Lead Developer was possibly a good choice from a purely psychometric point of view. Additionally, his results revealed that he was very respected in terms of his professional ability.
• We therefore recommended considering the current Lead Developer as the replacement IT Team Manager, provided of course that he met all other company requirements.
• The company needed to review its internal performance reporting because the IT Team Manager had uniformly excellent reports, which completely masked the reality of the situation
• The company needed to re-examine its core values and take effective action to improve a culture that appears to condone unacceptable behaviour
• Coaching and workshops were required to help unlock the creativity that seems to be strong within the team and help the team to communicate their ideas to line management by improving their report writing skills
• We also suggested a customised ELDI to focus more precisely on the company’s own core competencies

For more information on the case study or on the tools used please email us edacenquiries@edacen.com. 

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