Joining the top team
The corporate turn, collective responsibility and statutory officers.
- Level
- Bitesize
- Learning time
- 1 hour 45 minutes
- Where
- Becoming a Director
- Price
- £39
When you step up to a higher level, what you paid in the last 12 months for lower-level courses inside the bigger course comes off its price, in proportion to how much of each is inside it, whichever topic it's from. Courses at the same or a lower level don't give credit against each other. A Focus course or above always costs at least £15. Read the full terms
Certificate of Completion
Overview and Outcomes.
Overview
This module examines the shift from leading a service to helping lead a whole council. It draws on Marshall Goldsmith's warning about old habits, Michael Watkins's seven shifts to enterprise leadership and Robert Katz's three skills, sets out the five roles directors hold at once, contrasts the expert trap with corporate leadership, and uses the eight themes of the Solace and LGA senior leadership framework for honest self-reflection. This module explores how a corporate management team works and how directors carry shared decisions with integrity. It draws on Katzenbach's myth of the top team, Hambrick and Mason's upper echelons theory, Lencioni's first team, Hackman and Wageman on team conditions, four common failure modes and Avanti's Top Team Development Approach, which links individual, team and organisational development. This module examines how directors work with the chief executive and the statutory officers: the head of paid service, the section 151 officer, the monitoring officer and, in Wales, the head of democratic services. It covers their legal duties, including the section 114 report, what directors owe each role, how to raise a concern well, and how to support and challenge these officers without undermining their independence.
What you'll develop
In this Bitesize, you will develop the ability to:
- Explain why the move from head of service to director is a change in kind, using Goldsmith's insight, Watkins's seven shifts and Katz's three skills.
- Distinguish the habits of the expert trap from those of a corporate leader, and identify which you still rely on.
- Explain Katzenbach's distinction between a single-leader unit and real team mode, and how upper echelons theory links top team composition to strategy.
- Identify the four ways top teams go wrong and the features of public service top teams, including the place of statutory officers.
- Describe the duties of each statutory officer, including the section 114 report, and what a director owes each of them.
The Modules.
1 hour 45 minutes of learning.
- 01Foundations: The Corporate TurnThis module examines the shift from leading a service to helping lead a whole council. It draws on Marshall Goldsmith's warning about old habits, Michael Watkins's seven shifts to enterprise leadership and Robert Katz's three skills, sets out the five roles directors hold at once, contrasts the expert trap with corporate leadership, and uses the eight themes of the Solace and LGA senior leadership framework for honest self-reflection.36 min
- 02The Top Team: Corporate Leadership and Collective ResponsibilityThis module explores how a corporate management team works and how directors carry shared decisions with integrity. It draws on Katzenbach's myth of the top team, Hambrick and Mason's upper echelons theory, Lencioni's first team, Hackman and Wageman on team conditions, four common failure modes and Avanti's Top Team Development Approach, which links individual, team and organisational development.37 min
- 03The Chief Executive and the Statutory OfficersThis module examines how directors work with the chief executive and the statutory officers: the head of paid service, the section 151 officer, the monitoring officer and, in Wales, the head of democratic services. It covers their legal duties, including the section 114 report, what directors owe each role, how to raise a concern well, and how to support and challenge these officers without undermining their independence.37 min
Keep going.
Part of the Becoming a Director topic, also sold whole as The corporate turn.
Go deeper, and pay only the difference
- You are hereBitesize, 1 hour 45 minutes, £39
- Next stepFocus, Thinking corporately, 3 hours, £69. Already own the Bitesize? You pay £30.
- The whole topicExplore, The corporate turn, 6 hours, £129. Already own the Bitesize? You pay £90.
When you step up to a higher level, what you paid in the last 12 months for lower-level courses inside the bigger course comes off its price, in proportion to how much of each is inside it, whichever topic it's from. Courses at the same or a lower level don't give credit against each other. A Focus course or above always costs at least £15. Prices per person. Read the full terms
Also part of: Leading the whole, Toward the chief executive role
