Your organisation’s expectations are not the edge of the market.
An internal target is an agreement about expected performance. It is not independent evidence that the organisation has set a demanding enough standard. A team can meet every commitment on its scorecard while competitors build a stronger position.
This is uncomfortable because internal success is legible. We know the budget, the history and the constraints. External possibility is harder to see. Over time, the capability we already have can become the definition of what we believe is achievable.
That is the trap I want boards, CEOs and functional leaders to question. Familiarity deserves respect; it does not remove the need for an honest assessment. Equally, an external success story deserves scrutiny rather than automatic admiration.
Your current capability should never become the ceiling of your ambition.
Read two scoreboards, not one.
The first scoreboard asks whether you delivered against your plan. The second asks whether your position improved relative to relevant alternatives. The first measures execution against a promise. The second tests the ambition behind that promise.
Imagine a business growing by 6% against a 5% target while a genuinely comparable peer grows by 18%. The business has beaten its target by one percentage point, but its growth rate is twelve percentage points below the peer. Those statements can both be true. The figures here are illustrative, not observations about a particular company.
The comparison is only useful if the denominator is credible. Geography, starting scale, pricing, acquisitions, risk appetite and customer mix can explain differences. Compare the same period and define the outcome consistently. A weak comparator produces a confident-looking answer to the wrong question.
Change the assumptions below. Notice how the internal and external readings can diverge. Neither number, by itself, tells you whether a leader is doing a good job.
The internal target is met.
Your growth trails the peer.
Diagnose the constraint before judging the individual.
A slow transformation may reflect a capability gap. It may also reflect conflicting mandates, brittle systems, poor data, delayed investment or decisions reserved for a board that rarely meets. Replacing a person while preserving the constraint can simply restart the same failure.
Start with the outcome the business needs. Then separate the conditions required to achieve it: leadership judgement, specialist skill, decision authority, resources and organisational cooperation. Assess each against evidence rather than reputation.
- Define what better performance would look like in a specific operating context.
- Test whether the incumbent has the authority and resources the mandate assumes.
- Compare internal development, complementary capability, role redesign and external appointment.
- Agree an evidence-based review period and give the person a fair opportunity to respond.
The purpose of market intelligence is to widen the set of options. It should not turn every gap into a replacement brief. Sometimes the most valuable external insight is confirmation that your existing leader is strong and needs a better structure around them.
Market knowledge is valuable when it is specific.
A credible specialist recruiter can connect the business problem to leaders who have faced a comparable one. The useful conversation goes beyond job titles: what did the person inherit, what did they change, what resources did they control, and which outcomes can be independently substantiated?
Internal talent teams contribute deep organisational context. External specialists may add comparisons across organisations and conversations with people who are not applying to a vacancy. These perspectives work best together.
Recruiters are not automatically objective. Incentives, incomplete information and selection bias affect our view too. Ask for the reasoning behind a recommendation, the limits of the comparison and evidence that would change the assessment. A strong advisor should welcome those questions.
The best market conversation moves beyond available candidates to available capability.
External hiring has transition costs. Plan for them.
Matthew Bidwell’s study of a US investment-banking business, using personnel data from 2003 to 2009, found that external hires initially earned about 18% more than internally promoted employees in similar jobs. Internal promotees received higher performance ratings for the first two years; external hires also had higher exit rates.
This is evidence about a particular setting, not a universal premium or proof that rushed hiring caused the differences. It draws attention to organisation-specific knowledge, uncertainty about fit and the time needed to become effective.
My practical conclusion is to compare development and external appointment seriously, and to treat integration as part of the hiring decision. A compelling CV does not remove the need for stakeholder access, clear decision rights and a realistic learning period.
Before approving a search, articulate the capability that cannot currently be supplied, the alternatives considered and the conditions a new leader will need to succeed. That makes the eventual appointment a considered investment rather than an act of faith.
Make the benchmark a recurring discipline.
Do not wait for a resignation to learn what strong capability looks like. At each strategy review, ask whether the leadership model still fits the business you are trying to become. Keep the conversation proportionate, confidential and fair.
- What has changed in the market since our expectations were set?
- Where are we demonstrably strong, and where are we relying on our own history as the benchmark?
- Which performance gap is a people issue, and which is a system issue?
- What would we develop internally, add alongside the team, or seek externally—and why?
The aim is not permanent dissatisfaction. It is informed ambition: enough confidence to recognise good performance, enough humility to investigate a gap, and enough discipline to act when the evidence is clear.
Meeting the plan matters. Keep testing whether it is the right plan.
Sources & context
Personnel data from one financial-services firm’s US investment-banking business, 2003–2009. Findings should not be treated as universal hiring benchmarks.
Edited and expanded from Qasim MB’s original work ↗.