Through out my career it has been important to me to be different than just manager or someone’s boss. I wanted to be leader that could create an environment that could cultivate growth and success for its team. A leader that could get the most out of his team while everyone felt good about what they were accomplishing. Throughout my career I have been able to create this environment through the practice of Positive Leadership.
Showing compassion, developing the team, clear vision towards the goal, support, and accountability are just some of the ways a leader can work towards a positive leadership style if done correctly. In my career this leadership style has helped me overcome adversity, unite organizations, and transform toxic cultures to a positive thriving one.
Below are two examples of how positive leadership in my experience has been successful.
Culture Change – The Positive Way
Many companies struggle with the culture of their teams. Sometimes there are many silos inside a business that do not work together and have very different cultures. Positive cultures are not created overnight, however cultures can be destroyed much quicker. When there is a negative culture this can damaged a business from the inside out. I have experienced in several companies where a culture change was necessary for the business to grow. I have found that a culture change is only possible when you have a strong positive leader that can get the whole team rowing in the same direction. A leader that can give clear direction, give positive feedback, and hold accountability.
I was once brought into a situation where the region’s culture was toxic. There was no team work, the employees thought that corporate was deceiving, and that no one would support them. Everyone worked as an individual trying not get “caught” or trying to stay out of sight. Any time you would ask a question they would think you had a hidden agenda. This kind of culture was causing business to be lost, profitability to slip away, and staffing to become more and more difficult as team members would have enough and end up leaving. Of course their perception was wrong but why were they thinking this?
After digging into this region. Spending time with individuals working side by side gaining trust I was able to get real feedback. I had to understand why they felt this way when the reality and the perception were so far off. I was able to identify that the leadership in the region was very aggressive. The approach was to communicate problems, audit, discipline individuals and teams, and then look for more problems. All the team was doing was trying not to create any problems to get disciplined for. Management was just trying to find out what the team was doing wrong.
Clearly this region was lacking positive leadership. I knew this had to change. I replaced the leadership with positive leaders that had experience in culture change. Together we developed a vision and a mantra. We set clear goals and expectations to achieve them. We created a plan to work with everyone in the region understanding their strengths and where we could develop their other skills. We starting a communication strategy that would give daily, weekly, monthly updates and feedback in a team and individual environment. We celebrated success anytime we could, we relentlessly coached up anyone that started to pull a different direction. We held the accountability line making sure that everyone was on our bus.
Within a 6 month period the region could see change. The region was a team again. They were driven to be the best in the company. It wasn’t about how do I get my job done today. The culture turned into how do we win today. This kind of culture transformation in the largest region of the company helped support the longest run of consecutive months of record breaking revenue growth. It also supported an increase in profitability.
Acquisitions – The People Question
Anyone that has been a part of an acquisition team knows that there are a lot of moving parts. In my experience when the company would purchase a competitor it was my responsibility to oversee the transition merging the new company into ours. I always thought of these projects in two different pillars. You have the business side where you have to take ownership of the assets and get them transitioned into the new systems. The other pillar is the people.
During a new acquisition there is a lot of concern about what is going to happen to the newly acquired team and how does it affect the team that was already in place. Addressing these concerns quickly laying out a clear vision, getting old and new teams engaged together, being very visible, and being hands on is the best way to approach this. The teams will gravitate to the positivity, concerns will start to fade, and engagement will start to grow. The new team members for the acquisition can play a important role in a successful transition but they need to trust you. The need to see the positive leader that has their interest in mind.
I have been part of several acquisitions. Every time the positive leadership approach has allowed me to keep 100% of the employees during the transition. It has allowed me to quickly transition the acquired company into our systems and culture. It has also transformed teams that were tired and underperforming for their old company into top performing districts in their new environment.
