Identifying Your Style Of Leadership:
Reactive vs Proactive

When I was working at Colgate-Palmolive, one of our Production Team Members volunteered to take on the organization and management of the casual labor pool. This meant she arranged for the casual staff to come in, as and when they were needed and supervised their work. (All this over and above her 'normal' duties of running a filling line).

After a year or so, she came to me and said, "I'm not happy with the quality of people the agency is sending us. Their customer service has dropped. Also, I think we could get a better rate elsewhere. Can you do something about it?"

Now, in the early stages of my career, with my Reactive style of leadership (and with my 'need to feel important' hat on!), I would've immediately got on to the agency. Negotiated prices and demanded they improve the quality of casual labor they sent us and improve their customer service.

At the end of the process, I'd have figuratively rubbed my hands at a job well done (by me). Subconsciously thinking how very important I was. All these problems to fix. And I fixed them! (Isn't hindsight a beautiful thing. You can laugh at yourself, and appreciate how much you've grown and changed)

Instead, because of the wonderful mentoring I received over the years from some terrific leaders, I put my Proactive Style of Leadership hat on. I wanted to develop her skill set, and capability to tackle issues such as this.

So, my response was, "What do you think we should do? How do you want to go about it?".

Instead of providing her with solutions, the project was turned over to her. Obviously, with as much support as she felt she needed, so that she could grow and learn.

She struggled with providing feedback to the agency about their lack of customer service and negotiating with alternative suppliers. It was a whole new skill-set, she never dreamt she would develop - which came in handy in negotiating her home loan!

The silent message to her was: YOU ARE GOOD ENOUGH. I have absolute faith in your capability to make quality decisions, and to handle these people well. And you have my support if you need it.

By the end of the process, she had saved the company about $20,000 per annum. She took over the management and control of the entire Casual Staff Budget. She created a training schedule for casuals and monitored their performance. Ensuring they were working productively and safely at all times.

We went from a budget that had previously been somewhat out of control, to consistently coming in under-budget. And, the quality of the workmanship of the casuals greatly improved. She took huge pride in this part of her job. As a wonderful side benefit it helped improve her self-esteem.

What did we get out of this?

For the team leaders, it meant that it freed up about 20 minutes a day spent on managing casuals. We had a team member who was very focused on getting the best value from the casual staff. Something the team leaders didn't have the time to do. This created significant cost savings to the bottom line. And finally, a team member who felt that what she did makes a difference.

A simple shift in a style of leadership, with dramatically effective results.