The Leadership Capital Index

Investors are increasingly focusing on leadership as a key differentiator in their investment decisions. But they’ve been forced to rely on instinctive, subjective, and unreliable ways to measure its impact—until now. In this book, leadership scholar, author, and consultant Dave Ulrich proposes a “leadership capital index”—a Moody’s or Standard and Poor’s rating for leadership.

Drawing on research from investors and business leaders, and synthesizing the work of dozens of consulting firms and leadership experts, Ulrich offers a leadership index with two domains, each comprising five factors. The individual domain includes personal qualities, strategic prowess, execution proficiency, interpersonal skills, and fit between the leader’s style and the organization’s values. The organizational domain encompasses a leader’s ability to create customer-focused cultures, manage talent, demand accountability, use information to gain competitive advantage, and set up work processes to deal with change.

In successive chapters, Ulrich details rigorous metrics and methods for evaluating leaders on each of these factors. The result is a groundbreaking book that will be of vital interest not only to investors but also to boards of directors, executive teams, human resource and leadership development professionals, government and ratings agencies, and of course leaders themselves.