Individual practice with peer evaluation

“To lead by example”

MUJO VILAŠEVIĆ

What happened?

In 2018 I have just changed my job, started at a new Company, smaller business than it was before,
but it was still a part of major corporate Group. One of the top reasons for my change of job was my
dissatisfaction with my individual progress, environment I was in, decision making situations, stress
and all specifically by leadership style of my previous boss. Of course, as we all do, I took a part of
self – blame after leaving this job, convinced that I could have done better, and that it was partially
my fault that I didn’t manage to stay a part of that huge organization with formally offered me great
work conditions. I was a compliance associate back there and at my new job, since it was a smaller
company, I was the only and lead compliance officer.

Within first month of my new engagement, our Group Audit has been announced, by mother company
from Wienna. Their aim was to audit entire company’s business, with special accent on trading and
compliance issues. Of course, this was first experience for me, I have never done it by myself and
have no idea how I will manage such a huge task!

Then, my boss, Mr. B, approached me. He saw that I was nervous and anxious about the upcoming
audit. In this occasion, I think he made some leadership decisions that still resonate with me. We had
a long and nice talk. First thing, he asked me – what am I afraid of? Why do I think like that? Why
don’t I trust my self more? Than, he told me that no one was born with experience, hard choices or
smartest decisions. It’s a path to get trough. He was determined that I coordinate and lead this audit by
myself, because, as he told me, the reason why he hired me was not my experience nor my skills, but
the fact that he recognized in me values he share – work dedication, discipline and ethical resonance
of decision making. As he pointed out, that was enough for him to decide to give me a job, and to give
me this task. We wanted me to remember it – the values are the common ground, and if people don’t
meet them together, there is no expertise or skill that can hide that fact. It still resonates with me.
Also, he pointed out that for any support he is there for me, and that he also feels anxious some times
when given a completely new task, and he learned to make the best of that energy by being more
committed to the task itself. We agreed to have daily briefing every other day on after work coffee
about this.

Of course, I have done the task within due deadlines and with no significant problems.

What were the results?

The audit finished just fine, we had great results. But, even more important, thanks to Mr. B’s
decision making in crucial moment, believing in me, my values and giving me independence and
opportunity to try ... I was left with so many lessons learned. First of all, I gained the sense of
autonomy and own self – value. After this task that was given to me, with his trust, I felt that my
values are recognized, so that gave me additional drive to work even harder and to give that “extra
plus” effort. Another big result of his action as I described is that I was really convinced in his saying
– we did share values, human values. My major ally in this task were my discipline and work
dedication, but also, a lot of it was driven by ethics mindset – I was not afraid to show and tell all the
mistakes that I have noticed in our processes and I have uncovered them as they are to our auditors.
My aim was to have fair audit grade, not to show of as the best. And it gave amazing results. Auditors
were very satisfied and they have noticed that it is an advantage that we, as a small company, give the
opportunity to each team member to manage processes he owns, to be independent as much as he can,
which then can produce very efficient management system overall.
Of course, during the task itself, there were times in which I was thinking, was Mr. B too “people
driven” and not enough “task oriented”? Did he make a good choice or this was a gamble for him as
well, to try out, to see my behaviour? What if I have done it all wrong? Was he too spontaneous in his
decision? Did he considered everything? Sure, all of it is possible. But, as I was convinced by the
outcome, and especially in compare with my previous job – if people share the same values, they can
manage everything. Risk based decisions are part of every leadership decision making process and I
can understand that. But, if you don’t risk with best hope in people, what is there left?

Why did this happen?

I believe that my situation has happened like this for several reasons. First is of course the fact that
Mr. B selects his employees based on their shared values, which is a huge factor for him. Second, is
his extravert personality – he approached me directly and communicated to me what does he thinks,
what does he expects from me and why he believes I can do it. I think that this part of his personality
has a huge impact in his leadership style, but also in other’s perception of him as self – confident,
stable, calm and reasonable person.

What class concepts are relevant to this situation?

The described situation can easily be given as an example of people – oriented behaviour. Mr. B has
shown me that he has empathy, he was interested in my problems, in my situation and work anxiety
due to expected Group audit. He also wasn’t distanced from social bonding even after work hours to
discuss in some more relaxed atmosphere with coffee, on our briefings. I sincerely believe that by this
situation, and his remarkable implementation of values – driven leadership, Mr. B has done a great
thing for me as an individual, he has boosted my self – confidence, my team contribution and shown
us an example of transformational leadership.

What did you learn from this?

Anything is possible if you share the same core values. Leadership is about being present at key
moment, not present in each and even the smallest step of the task. People need to be seen, be heard
and get the feeling that they and their position is understood by their leaders. Leaders need to show
their people they matter to them, they are ready to give them the opportunity and to validate their
work properly, on human level. After all, the most important asset of each company is not its car fleet
or bank account, but people who make an organization a second family.