Every now and then I receive an email that really makes me stop and think – today was one such occasion.

A little background…… last week I had the pleasure of talking to a group of undergraduates from my Business School as part of their Alumni week. My role was to share with them my career experiences along with what I hope they found were some interesting insights of how they might expect their careers to develop in the future.

It was a conversation that I’d had with numerous groups over the years but an element that was different in this case was the subsequent discussion about my role at the Business School as Chair of the Alumni Executive which in turn led on to the topic of my leadership blog. Over the subsequent days there was the normal flow of follow up emails requesting further information and requests for coaching but one had a different take that I would like to share with you.

In essence the young man in question had some difficulty reconciling the fact that I have spent the best part of forty years in one company (albeit a great one!) yet could write with such diversity and understanding on the subject of leadership that he felt was commensurate with somebody with  a much wider background.

To quote him “…. I had naiively assumed that the key to gaining exceptional business sense and developing good leadership skills was to work in a variety of different companies, sectors and cultures…”

Once I got past the “Why not” response that immediately triggered in my head I began to think about the essence of his assumption and how, in turn, organisations might address this issue when looking for their next generation of leaders – should they grow their leaders from within or should they acquire fresh blood from elsewhere as the opportunity arose. I also began to think about some of the companies that I’d worked with over the years and how they had approached the issue.

As I mulled these questions over in my mind it soon became evident to me that the strategies employed by a significant number of these companies could best be described as ad-hoc being more an expression of preference rather than the result of strategic intent. Of those that had considered the question at some length it did not appear to me that too much consideration had been given to the impact of their policy on the existing team – how would the acquisition of new talent from outside be viewed by the existing aspirational leaders within?

As I considered the consequences for these organisations of this apparent lack of policy in this vitally important area a thought struck me – one thing I do know is for certain is that I’m really looking forward to meeting that young man again next week….should be an interesting conversation for both of us.