After
watching the two videos about the leaderships of Jim McIngvale, owner of
Gallery Furniture (VitalSmarts,
n.d.) and four star general Stanley McChrystal (McChrystal, 2011), I see how each
individual has approached their unique obstacles and experiences and learned to
overcome them. McIngvale has a more
traditional story to tell. His story
speaks of a company that was strong and successful and then succumbed like many
others during the housing market crash.
To add insult to injury, this historic economic decline was followed by
a fire that almost wiped the company off the map. In many cases, a company so severely damaged
in such a short period of time would have gone bankrupt, but McIngvale was able
to keep his company above water. His
true leadership skills showed through when he decided to implement the
influencer training. One of the biggest problems
he was facing was a decline in sales due to a drop in customers. He attributed this to less customers visiting
the store therefore less sales. He
needed to find a way to retain the customers that visited his store, even if
they didn’t purchase anything on the first visit. He also realized that his sales force had
little to no experience in prospecting, which meant that once those customers
walked out that door, any future opportunities would walk out with them. Using the influencer training he was able to
change the behavior of his employees.
First of all, he needed to retrain the way they thought of prospecting
and turn a negative into a positive. The
training served as a way to demonstrate the benefits of prospecting and
contacting and how easy it was to be successful. In the case of Gallery Furniture, McIngvale
realized he could not change the environment, which was an unstable economy and
a customer-base hesitant to spend money.
But, he could change the behavior of all the members of his
organization. This is a clear example of
how one leader was able to change and transform his company from the inside
out.
In
the case of general McChrystal, he speaks to us as well of environments in
transformation and how organizations stay current by being adaptable and
sharing in a common vision. McChrystal
talks to us about one of the oldest organizations, the military, and how he has
had to adapt, mold and transform his own behaviors in order to survive in an
ever-changing technologically evolving environment. He explains to us that as long as you have a
shared vision, are willing to adapt, and as he explains “a lot more willing to
listen, a lot more willing to be reverse-mentored from lower” (McChrystal, 2011) that you can
become a good leader. McChrystal shows
us that good leaders not only lead from the top, but also from the bottom.
In
relating this to our readings, I believe that both leaders in the video
understand how important it is for companies to be adaptable. Brown states that “organization
transformation refers to these drastic changes and how an organization functions
and relates to its environment” (Brown,
2011, p. 398). I think the key to successful leadership is understanding
your relationship to the current environment and knowing when and how to
evolve. In nature, species live or die
dependent on their ability to evolve; this metaphor is equally true for
businesses.
Brown
explains that the more committed members are to the values of the company and
the more members that share those same values, the higher the chance for
success during transformation (Brown, 2011). In the case of Gallery Furniture, I believe that
the commitment to the company was strong, but maybe not all the members shared
the same values. Although I do believe
from watching the video that the desire to move the company in the right
direction and the member commitment is what made the members eager to embrace
these new values such as prospecting. In
this case we could say that they had a moderate culture to begin with and moved
towards a stronger culture. In the case
of McChrystal, I believe the military has always had high commitment and high
values which can make transformation either very easy, because members are
mission-centered or very difficult because change is more difficult.
When
we compare these two companies with the quadrants of the strategy-culture
matrix, it’s easy to see how Gallery Furniture was in need of immediate
strategic change, but the culture was resistant to the new techniques and
processes. Brown would categorize this
strategy as managing around the culture. Strategies for military leadership would fall
more between managing around the culture and managing culture for the mere fact
that there is a huge generational gap. Some
mature leaders may have their “standard” ways of doing things that clash with
newer methods, while younger soldiers are easily groomed for these newer environments.
I
remember when the economic crisis hit and I was working at an IT firm. Our company was lucky and only a few people
were laid off. Yet, certain sacrifices
had to be made and job roles were adapted to the current situation. For starters, bonuses, incentives and pay
raises were put on hold. People were
more than happy as long as they kept their jobs. Another transformative strategy was to make
all of us salespeople. We had a sales
department that executed this role, but times were tough and therefore everyone
from accountants to executive consultants were asked to prospect. I was given cold call lists to follow up with,
although this was outside of my arena and comfort zone. We all pulled together and were able to
maintain the company afloat.
My
takeaway from all of this is inspired by what general McChrystal said during
his TedTalk. He said “if you're a leader, the
people you've counted on will
help you up. And if you're a leader, the
people who count on you need you on your feet” (2011). When our IT firm faced the option to sink or
swim, everyone assumed the leadership position. We all understood that we stood together or
fell together. I don’t remember people
griping or complaining about their new roles. Sales were what the company needed, and so
sales is what we all put our efforts into. Brown (2011) tells us that “organizations are
driven by a vision, not by directives from the chain of command” (p. 404) and I
believe that we all shared in that vision and this is what kept our company
alive while others crumbled around us.
References
