Energix- session 9

1. Does effective strategic leadership depend on the situation or is there ‘one right way’? Why?

Effective strategic leadership does not have one silver bullet, or one road map. The definition of wisdom tells us that wisdom is placing the right idea at the right place however that is not it, but also crucially important at the right time, in other words right idea + right place +right time = wisdom, in the case of Energix not only the strategy has to be right when and where it ought to apply is equally important for the strategy to be successful, when to apply and how to apply determines the ultimate success of strategy. This needs two important things in addition to ‘luck’ luck meaning possessing divine touch, clear and objective observation as to ‘whom’ the strategy intends to change and intuitiveness as to possessing the right intuition ‘right instinct’  which goes back to ‘luck’ as it may mean ‘trait’. Examples will be applied below on question 2. As will be explained below the culture, expectation and priorities of the employees of Energix did not conform to the vision of David.

2. Why was David successful in one role and not in another?

David had adopted an analytical approach to examine the productivity and the operation of the company as COO, had gathered all the data and facts he needed by going through the record of the company and expressed his concerns to the CEO and despite all these right approaches he did not fit into Energix based on his lack of understanding towards the culture of the company. From his appearance and both body language as well as aggressive rhetoric to enforce his policies created communication barrier between him and his followers, he may have had the right ideas but did not possess the right recopy to apply them.

All the successful leaders are good listeners  and able to read between the lines, let alone doing this, David failed to even listen to the CEO when the CEO told him to use more soothing tone and less tough military style language like that of the NFL. Another major blow to David was change does not take over night it has to run its course, he was not patiently persistent in his quest of hasty ‘Zeal’, knowing the company never hired its leaders from outside before should have been strong indication to him how conservative the culture of the company is. The priority of the company had been to finish already overdue turbines rather than going to change the long term productivity of the company. One has to deal with the short term issues first before the long term comes. Neither his observation was thorough nor has his intuition as mentioned in question one and ultimately one has to adopt in an environment first before he leads which David never did. Although those who hired him could have eased the pain for him it is my opinion that person with the celebre of COO with experience should have known adopting in the corporate culture of the firm first is very wise.  

3. What have you seen other people do in other case studies that might have worked well here? e.g. NHS, IDEO, Challenger, Madonna, Carrefour

David’s short comings had a lot do with his appearance, how he is perceived by his followers, he appeared he had nothing in common with the very people he intended to lead and change which means he is perceived to be outsider rather than insider. For example Mr Robinson and the IDEO leaders both have appeared to their followers as insiders although Mr Robinson was ironically just as outsider as David had been to Energix. Also Madonna knows her audience precisely which means in addition to her intuition her observation of the psychic of her followers seems to be spot on. David could have said ‘people are just people’ just like Mr Robinson and they need to be listened and respected, people want to be appreciated even if they need to be rehabilitated or changed. Therefore he should have employed persuasion tactics such as Mr Robinson’s.