LEADERSHIP IN BUSINESS Provide an example of your leadership and explain what you learned about yourself through the experience.

Currently, I manage a key project to drastically decrease the manufacturing cycle time of a X unit. The payoff for this project is huge because reducing the cycle time means more X units can be produced in less time, thus increasing the company’s profitability. However, achieving this goal involves redesigning a significant portion of the current production line.

As the project lead, I manage a team of 10 people, including 8 engineers and 2 buyers, where no one reports directly to me. Consequently, the first few months entailed me learning how to best communicate with each team member and how to effectively delegate tasks. As I grew more comfortable in my role, I gained more insight into how I lead.

My leadership style focuses on face-to-face communication, as I learned that people respond better to in-person conversations about tasks as opposed to long-winded emails. Of course, emails are important for quick, minor details, but investing time upfront in building relationships in person pays off in the long run. For instance, by establishing a mindset of collaboration and ownership, people are more invested in the project and take the time to properly communicate ideas, project updates and potential issues. Having this openness and willingness to communicate is critical for my role, as without formal authority I rely on my team to provide me all necessary information to keep the project on track. Likewise, building strong relationships with my team facilitates delegation and project progress.

Through managing this project, I learned I can successfully lead a team to accomplish a goal on-time even when challenges arise – like a delayed milestone or limited /competing resources. Now, I am ready to take advantage of Goizueta’s numerous resources to further develop my leadership skills and style.