Impactful Leadership

Debdip Bhattacharjee

Anecdotes of exemplary leadership at work place - when my leadership had an impact and how the IE program can improve

The Three Situations…

1. Promotion to Team Management: Rejection

Management

2. Team Building: Diversity Management

3. Social Responsibility: CSR with HOPE

Foundation Kolkata, India, on behalf of HSBC Credit & Risk

1. Promotion as Team Leader - Resistance & Rejection: THE SITUATION

• I was internally promoted to manage a Team of 6 Assistant Managers in Feb’2011

• Peculiarity of the situation was that two of those six were also in the race for the coveted position.

• It lead to a point were past candidates for the post were influencing the entire team to outright reject my leadership.

• The senior management of my company wanted to test my caliber and hence left the situation to be handled entirely by myself.

• The team seemed so united to reject me as a leader that all I tried back-fired.

• Started conflicts, arguments, decline in work quality, escalations from business network, and an overall decline in work environment.

• Though I had a mix of tenured reportees, the senior members of the team seemed to have a significant influence on the team.

I introspected hard and decided to follow a passive leadership style…

Resistance Management - The impact of passive leadership style & Expectation from IE

Leadership Impact: Managing the situation•Firstly, I went into the back-seat and ensured no abrupt changes; from time to time ignoring the leadership rejection while I tested the passive leadership strategy.•I started making the senior members of the Team feel important by

o empowering them with higher responsibilitieso making them mentors to new joiners o making them represent the team in senior management forumsThis separated the seniors from the rest of the team, which now became

easier to manage. •Results started coming in 3 months with leadership acceptance, friendship, and quality improvement.

Through the IE experience •I wish to expand my creative nerve and learn various leadership styles especially ‘situational leadership’, •which I believe can be best learned through experience sharing in a diverse environment, •through as rigorous a structured methodology as offered by IE.

2. Team Building and Diversity Management: THE SITUATION

• After promotion in Feb’2011, besides Team management, I was also trusted with the additional task of Team Building as our team grew from 9 to 15.

• Our recruitment objective included a balance of diversity. Such team building exercise was entrusted to me along with managing my current team.

• My current team was already of a diverse culture with a combination of members from various parts of the country. The team represented two ladies, two seniors and two new joiners.

• I was challenged every day on managing the diversity from bottom-up and on Team building from top-down. I decided to tackle the problem by breaking it up into short tasks….

Building Team & Diversity Management: Employee engagement drive and Behavior

Managing the situation•Firstly, I empowered the senior members of the team by assigning them as deputy managers – but with strict monitoring. This helped me prioritize tasks, manage time & groom future leader.•I also dealt with the ladies of the team with lots of empathy, accommodating work life balance.

A spree of employee engagement activities were also introduced to ensure the team transforms into a family.

• On Team building - behavior parameter was introduced at the first round during recruitment to assess whether the interviewee has acceptable behavior. If accepted, technical round followed.

Behavior and attitude tested as a priority at the first round was a unique way of recruitment. This not only ensured that we recruited apt individuals as per organizational needs but also brought a fresh breeze into the stereotyped system, saving a lot of time of the recruiter.

• On diversity - I went through a learning experience with each of the team members– understanding culture, custom & history.

Building Team & Diversity Management: The IE expectation and difference

• The diverse environment of IE Business School, with students entering from 90+ countries, is perfect to appreciate differences and learning of cross-cultural values and principles.

The diverse faculty profile also adds further to learning from different domains, situations and working style.

Specific interest lies in Area 31. The entrepreneurial spirit is based on innovation but must also be based on Team work. It is the behavior and attitude that shapes an individual, and I remain keen to not only learn the entrepreneurial spirit but also hone my personality further to take on team building exercises in future.

• Through the ‘Leadership Lab’ I, II and III, spread across Core Periods, I would also strengthen my leadership and team working capability.

• Opportunities beyond the program and the IE Campus life also provides scope to expand my horizon.

• Unique and best in its class – the customization option is rare and would provide me to optimize the leadership potential in me

3. Social Responsibilities : ‘80 ways around the world’

• With people ready to flush money in CSR but not ready to volunteer, for the past two years I have been an active volunteer in the HSBC Credit & Risk CSR affair for ‘HOPE Foundation Kolkata’ (an arm of HOPE Foundation Dublin).

• I take pride in this leadership event where its remains an everyday challenge to motivate, push, force, request, beg and inspire individuals that today we need the awareness and empathy to spread more than we require the funds.

• This year we covered (virtually) the distance from our office in Manchester to our Kolkata office through various modes of transportation – swimming, cycling, walking, skating etc. An event we called ‘80 WAYS AROUND THE WORLD’

• We raised a whopping £9000+ in this month long event to help the street children of Kolkata get the necessary vaccines.

A prime reason for selecting IE is its due focus on Social responsibilities and seeing social innovation going beyond business. I would consider studying at IE not only a matter of pride but also a matter of great satisfaction as IE creates change makers for the society and the underprivileged.