Bridging the GAP — From Awareness to Action

It’s not enough to know where the GAP is – you must also build a bridge to get your people where you want them to go. Leaders who stop at mapping alone, leave their people stranded. Leaders who commit to bridging, transform challenges into opportunities and position their organizations for sustainable success.

In Parts 1 and 2, we explored why leaders must mind the GAP and how to map it with clarity and courage. Now comes the moment that separates aware leaders from transformational ones: building the bridge.

Options for Closing the GAP

Savvy leaders don’t try to close every gap at once. Instead, they choose from three strategic approaches, and layer them for maximum impact:

1. People Moves

Hiring to fill critical skills.
Promoting high-potential leaders into stretch roles.
Providing coaching, training, and development.
Creating succession pipelines for critical roles.

2. Structural Moves

Redesigning teams for clarity and agility.
Clarifying roles and responsibilities to remove duplication or confusion.
Establishing decision rights, so the right people make the right calls.

3. Cultural Moves

Embedding values into daily leadership practices.
Building accountability into how leaders are measured.
Strengthening feedback and recognition loops.
Aligning reward systems with desired behaviors.

Each move strengthens the bridge between today’s platform and tomorrow’s train.

Internal vs. External: Who Should Lead the Work?

One of the biggest questions leaders face is whether to close gaps with internal resources or bring in external support. The answer is rarely either/or – it’s both/and.

Internal teams are best for continuous monitoring, small adjustments, and ensuring accountability over time. They live the culture and can make change stick.
External consultants provide objectivity, expertise, and the courage to name what politics or ego may try to hide. They’re particularly valuable when stakes are high, or when leaders need help seeing blind spots.

For instance, use internal teams to monitor engagement scores monthly, but bring in external expertise when redesigning your leadership development program or navigating a major cultural shift. The best partnerships happen when external consultants transfer knowledge to internal teams, building your capacity for future GAP work.

The most effective executives know when to lean on each. Admitting you need perspective is not weakness – it’s leadership maturity.

Mindset Shifts That Enable Action

Bridging the GAP requires more than a plan – it requires mindset shifts that sustain momentum:

From scarcity (“We don’t have what we need”) → to possibility (“We can build what we need”).
From ego (“I should already know this”) → to leadership maturity (“The strongest leaders ask for perspective”).
From urgency-only (“We’ll fix it later”) → to discipline (“We’ll integrate GAP thinking into how we lead”).
From reactive (“We’ll deal with problems as they arise”) → to proactive (“We’ll anticipate and prevent gaps before they widen”).

These shifts free leaders to move with confidence, rather than fear, as they address gaps head-on.

Embedding GAP Thinking Into Daily Leadership

Closing gaps once a year is not enough. Forward-thinking leaders treat GAP Analysis as part of their operating system.

Quarterly GAP Reviews: Discuss people strategy alongside financial results.
People Dashboards: Track engagement scores, flight risk indicators, leadership bench depth, and critical skill availability as core metrics alongside your financial KPIs.
Micro-GAP Conversations: Encourage every leader – from the C-suite to frontline managers – to ask, “What’s missing? What needs strengthening?” In team meetings, normalize questions like, “What capability would help us execute this faster? Or “Where are we one person deep in critical knowledge?”
Cultural Norms: Treat naming gaps as an act of stewardship, not criticism.

When GAP thinking becomes routine, you don’t just close gaps – you prevent new ones from widening.

What’s Next?

Whether you’re working independently or with external support, start with these immediate actions:

Complete your Talent Optimization GAP Checklist if you haven’t already.
Choose one Quick Win from your assessment and implement it this month.
Schedule your first quarterly GAP review for next quarter.
Begin incorporating micro-GAP questions into your regular team conversations.

Closing Thought & Call to Action

Minding the GAP is more than a one-time exercise – it’s a leadership discipline. Leaders who consistently pay attention to the space between today’s reality and tomorrow’s ambition create organizations where people thrive, culture aligns, and strategy is executed with precision.

The Talent Optimization GAP Checklist reveals where your gaps are. The bridge comes when you decide to act.

Ready to transform your GAP insights into strategic action? Let’s discuss how to build your bridge. At Meraki, we help leaders turn GAP awareness into strategic advantage – bridging today’s reality with tomorrow’s potential.

Schedule a consultation with Meraki

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Jason G.

May 2, 2024.

I’ve had the pleasure of working with Nicole as a consultant, trainer, and administrator of Predictive Index for both for-profit and non-profit entities. In both cases, the PI software proved to have an immediate impact on my teams With the non-profit organization, we used PI to evaluate both our board members and frontline outreach teams. The PI data was used to better align our board committees and to give our executive director an easy-to-read playbook for managing the diverse personalities and motivations of a growing board. I’m unaware of what other tools could have given us the deep insights we got from PI, and they came at a critical time. It was indeed a blessing. With our outreach teams, PI gave us the same level of operational management insight. We were also able to leverage the software as a screening tool within our hiring process. Nicole trained several of our board members and team leads on the software so that we had the working knowledge to access and integrate the many recommendations into our daily workflows. Due to the successful implementation with the non-profit, I introduced Nicole to the HR manager at my employer. I suggested an in-house demo with one of our teams that needed some tweaking following a recent expansion. There was some hesitation, even a little pushback. Some team members felt we were “too busy” even to take the questionnaire, let alone roll out whatever new practices it would recommend. What’s rewarding about PI is that the whole system initiates with two simple questions. Even those in opposition had to yield to its simplicity. From there, it was a similar experience as that with the non-profit. The “work-style” assessments were incredibly accurate, and they immediately helped the team’s directors identify the sources of common tension points within the group. I left that organization for a C-level position with another company, and I was able to perform the same team and organizational assessments for my new group. Consistently, PI delivered the relevant insights to empower us as leaders to get the most out of our group. Beyond that, the PI assessments spotlight what our organization is presently set up to accomplish vs. what we, as leaders, have defined as our organizational goals. That distinction is invaluable and eye-opening as we focus our strategic plans. Far more than the value of the software, Nicole’s expertise, generosity, patience, and compassionate nature have been instrumental in helping our teams understand and adopt the PI recommendations. We operate in a competitive industry, and people management has never been as challenging as now with the recent shifts in the labor market. I’m thankful to have PI as a tool and Meraki as a partner to help us be more skillful and efficient in our people management, which, of course, translates directly to the successful delivery of our products and services.

T.H., Non-profit

January 6, 2024.

The depth of Nicole’s heart is unmeasurable. I met her for the first time in a parking lot unloading necessities for a group of young people who were searching for guidance and in need of necessities. Her giving didn’t stop there. She continued to bless our non-profit with her gifts and resources. Two years later she is pouring into our organization with her wisdom, using the Predictive Index to build a foundation that has taken our non-profit to stages that a “new” and “small” non-profit can only dream and hope for. Her wisdom, gifts, and talents have changed our organization! We doubled our guesstimated reach of serving vulnerable youth this year, youth that are wandering our streets, in the community we call home, searching for someone who will show them their worth. Our mission is that no youth will journey life on their own without a consistent, healthy adult beside them. Meraki Consulting Partner is walking beside our team and we are so deeply grateful, as is our community and the youth we’re currently serving and will serve! Thank you!

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December 15, 2023.

“I have gone into a coaching session completely broken and in tears. Everything seemed to be going wrong in my life and work was a nightmare. Nicole listened to everything I said and even brought things to my attention that I had never really thought about. By the end of our session, I was laughing and had a game plan for tackling issues at work and home.”

D.R., Engineer

October 12, 2023.

"Nicole is undaunted in her approach to breaking down the barriers of limiting beliefs. Thanks to her I have a new appreciation for my strengths and talents and the desire to grow even more than I have already.”

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Bridging the GAP — From Awareness to Action

Bridging the GAP — From Awareness to Action

Options for Closing the GAP