6 CONNECT
is the glue that helps build your impact for all that you want or need
CONNECT
‘Eventually everything connects – people, ideas, objects. The quality of the connections is the key to quality per se.’
– Charles Eames
Iunderstood this much later that life becomes more fulfilling when you start to reflect, consolidate and build on the experience gained during your journey. The game changes when you start to get ready for the race for a leadership position. It is no more about how well you do your day job, That is simply assumed. As you season with experience, a certain level of substance and capability is understood, given you may have already been tested and assessed through various assignments for performance and potential. Now it is all about how you manage the environment, ambiguity of leadership, build the connects and are able to look into the crystal ball to decipher the future. Intuition becomes crucial as you go up the ladder to have it all.
I believe that our ability to connect with others in our environment, allows us to improve our judgement by broadening our thinking while garnering support. Pieces of knowledge, information, or context, in isolation do not serve much purpose at leadership levels. It is the ability to weave these together meaningfully that lends leadership its substance and a sound intuitive decision making.
In my observations, as women grow through this journey, they tend to focus a lot on building their content expertise. They may want to however, leverage their natural relationship strengths more, to nurture connects at various levels: within their teams, peers and seniors in the organisation. Further, as they grow into more senior roles, internal networks may not be sufficient to achieve all that you need to achieve in your role. External networks, awareness of what is going on in the environment can become critical differentiators. Building and nurturing these, however, take concerted time and effort. Nothing worthwhile comes easy! Any professional would do well to systematically evaluate their need for such connections and then work on widening or deepening it, as the need may be. This will help broaden the perspective and your skills, thereby fueling your success.
THE UNDENIABLE POWER OF NETWORKING
I grew up thinking that people at work fall into two categories where either they were my friends, or were not my friends. There was nothing in between. For friends, I had a lot of time and commitment, and I expected the same to be reciprocated. Over a period of two decades of work, I have come to learn, that there are varying shades of friendships and acquaintances. We should not expect or give ourselves completely to each close working relationship. I know this may seem obvious to many but it wasn’t to me. Many a time, this led to some painful interaction when there were expectation mismatches.
This changed perspective has been the foundation for me to build my network. I have a core group at work and outside work who I trust completely and engage regularly (and vice-versa), irrespective of roles, transitions and issues. They make my anchor group, as I referred to earlier.
The next critical part of our connect is the broader internal network that is slightly distant but needs to be engaged with periodically. It is important to know people internally (especially in a matrixed environment) as people will associate and work with you effectively only if they have some familiarity with you. The better you know each other, the smoother the working relationship becomes, across business and product silos, enhancing productivity at all ends. However, building these connects and keeping them going, takes effort. You have to constantly find the opportunities at work to connect with people you need to or want to. Building your network is essential for navigating within your operating environment. Women Networks in many organsiations can provide the needed support to women who wish to reach out. Often women lag behind in proactive networking at work due to demands at home after work.
Being an introvert, I used to be hesitant in socialising at work, especially when required to connect at senior levels. Maybe seniority was intimidating as well. I have to confess, this is where I learnt from younger talent who were more confident than I was in getting their share of time with the seniors in the organisation.
I recall, once a junior banker came to meet me in my office in London. He was very excited about his first trip to the New York office and wanted to know what was the best way to reach out to the Global Head of a business. I was taken aback and asked him why he would want to meet him and why he thought the senior would even entertain him? He said that he wanted to connect with him, to ensure that the senior knew who he was (and probably what a great talent he was!). He thought the senior would want to see him if he is one of the few who had the courage to send him an e-mail and ask him for his view about his portfolio and so on. He left me a bit stunned. I figured that he was right. Why had I not thought like this before? Rest assured, he got his time with the Global Head and leveraged that time well to leave some good impressions.
When I did start to proactively reach out to people they were more welcoming than I had expected. When I asked for guidance they willingly offered; when I requested someone to mentor me, to my surprise they gladly consented, even stating that it was their pleasure! Very often, we impose limitations on ourselves about whom and how we should build our network. But there are actually no constraints. Having a good internal network also aids our work, helping with an easier execution of priorities, especially some that require support from a larger group and team. When we work with people across borders, sometimes without ever meeting them, a personal touch can do magic to a working relationship. Without that level of connection, the work, however important it may be, remains transactional.
I required some support to work through a key project that was percieved by the larger team beyond my capabilities. To build their confidence, it was imperative to build an anchor group for support. This required investing in a few peer relationships, which were with both men and women. There were a few people who were similar to me or understood me better than others. I engaged with them proactively as we planned the project. I reached out to few team members and seniors and requested for guidance/mentoring. Mentors were like mirrors and reflected to me what was going on around me especially if I took a misstep. Peers and team members helped me align strategies to the larger goal and defended me at appropriate moments in case issues surfaced. We all need some support as none of us are invincible. This anchor group is something I have since then always relied on. The members may change as you change roles. Older members have always remained my friends. As you grow, this group grows along, giving you more strength. You just need to have the motivation to reach out to people!
CONNECTIONS HELP DEAL WITH TRANSITION AND AMBIGUITY
I remember when I had indicated my interest in the India CHRO role, (partly driven by my motivation to come back to India as my husband had been there for a while then), the slate had some very capable candidates. India is considered to be a large and complex role, with a dynamic, everchanging and a somewhat challenging business environment relative to other countries. In addition to this, the management team at that time was being re-organised and had many new members hence leadership development was a key focus. Also, the gender diversity ratio was not where the firm would have aspired for it to be.
Due to various reasons, the job posting had taken time and the process was some time away. I was offered an interim role to move to India that was much smaller than what I was doing in Europe. It probably was at a similar level and scope as my past roles in India. It felt like it was a step back at that time relative to my aspirations. I felt a sense of dissonance during that period. I felt unsure of where I was going with this change. Some of my peers advised me not to move ahead, while my mentors, who probably had a broader perspective, encouraged me to take a leap of faith and helped me deal with the anxiety of ambiguity.
Given my aspirations, I wanted to move up on the next step of the ladder. I was advised that it would be helpful for me to get there and understand the environemnt before
the role opened up, even though there was no guarantee of me getting it. If I did not get the role after this interim position, it would have been a setback to my designated path.
One night, I pondered on this transition for a few hours. I reflected back over my investment and effort at work, staying away from family to support the business, in Europe. I started to feel bogged down. Confused with my own feelings and thoughts, I called a senior leader in the bank whom I respected a lot. He was very patient and heard me out. He listened to everything and then said, ‘Anu, you need to get there. I am sure you will make this work. If for any reason something does not work out, we will figure this out together. It will be fine.’ He also helped me arrive at a Plan B. That was very reassuring and calming. My conversation with him gave me the strength to battle my anxieties. Even though the situation had not changed, someone underwriting my ambiguity gave me the force to take the leap with a positive mindset and energy. I took the risk of the smaller role and went to India a few months ahead of the role being open. Had I not connected with this mentor, I would probably have not put myself in the reckoning for the job.
I underwent the selection process when the role opened up, in a fearless way and things went in the right direction. I believe that one of the key differentiators I possessed in comparison to the other candidates was that even though I had been away from India for long, my relationships with the relevant stakeholders and business communities were alive. A long-term focused approach to connect turned out to be a big advantage in positioning me well for a large leadership role in India, the first to be done by a woman!
The anxiety I experienced was natural but at times it filled me with some self-doubts. What gave me comfort was having a Plan B, relying upon a senior mentor to remind me that it existed. I could have had my Plan B within the organisation or outside. Going forward, during transitions, I now weigh my options and think through various scenarios, especially when certain variables may be beyond my control. Thinking of the worst that can happen, gives me the much-needed strength to take battles on. My own experience was that I played too safe earlier, sometimes unnecessarily. Usually, we like to have all the steps sorted upfront and want to feel fully equipped to manage the next assignment. Howeer, I learnt that this is not always possible. Insisting on it creates anxiety, hindrances and distances us from our real goals. In life you need to apprehend the future, hoping for the best but being prepared for the worst. Learn to deal with ambiguity, life is ever-evolving and always changing. Believe in yourself, take a bet on yourself. If you don’t then who else will?
SEEING THE BIG PICTURE TO UNDERSTAND WHO TO CONNECT WITH
As one moves to senior-leadership roles, the environment gets more cloudy and fuzzy. It becomes extremely important to interpret your surroundings correctly to be able to find the right path. Without deciphering your path, it is difficult to continue on the journey and respond to twists and turns around you. As you may have picked up from my earlier experiences, success finally became a result of how I responded to what was happening around me. My misses were also attributable to not reading the tea leaves properly and in time. I had only myself to blame for this. When I stayed back in London, in spite of a personal hardship, it helped me tremendously later in my career. My focus at that time was what I could take away from this experience. I had to keep the bigger picture and a mid-long-term play in mind. It is usually the understanding of this larger picture in the present and the future that helps us connect the dots and take the right decisions. Taking a broader view also helps you zoom in and out of a situation. Very often, while dealing with tricky problems at work, I often zoom myself out of it and look at all that is happening around me – the various players, different processes and then look at how this problem fits in there. This has always helped me find the right way forward. I am then able to see the connection between different issues, dynamics, people and then the decision becomes evident.
I took over the India CHRO role amongst a fairly-new leadership team, a business transitioning out of immense change. In my function, I had inherited a team that was probably yet stabilising itself amidst all this change as well. My first focus was to get the team sorted as without doing so the delivery for the business was almost impossible. Team satisfaction scores had not moved beyond mid-levels over the last few years. The team was a bit fragmented. Most members felt far closer association with people outside their team and stakeholders, rather than being part of an integrated function. My predecessor had actually really helped by infusing some great talent, but he had not been here long enough to do any further. It required a build-up. Some people really did not believe that there would be a positive change. Cynicism was rife.
In the first few weeks, I zoomed out of the situation and almost floated over various issues, teams, sub-teams, got to talking to people, travelling, and understanding what was going on. What was evident was that there was a lot to be done. I commenced by focusing on building a deep connect within the team itself to start with. I also reached out to several key HR stakeholders, search firms and forum chairs to get their objective view of what was needed to be our priorities. This went on to play a key role in the transformation that the team really needed. I do believe that it benefitted not just the team collectively but several individuals tremendously to develop a better perspective, thus allowing us to make a much larger impact for our stakeholders. Over a period of time we organised ourselves differently to internal and external environment. We upgraded ourselves to align to business demands and eventually got on the progressive path where our senior leaders had wanted us to be.
FOCUS ON OUTSIDE – IN VIEW
As is often talked about in the leadership journey that having a view or a perspective from the outside-in is key to understand how external world impacts you or your deliverables. It is extremely important to have an external network to gauge this. To enable this, you have to be constantly connected to the market to understand trends, strategies, bench-marking capabilities, team performance and perceptions about the organisation. There is a wealth of knowledge which is created every day in the market. Any gap here would imply you will be left behind. Networking with clients, partners, and forums is a great way of getting market intelligence to make you work better and help you march on the path to establish your brand.
One of my earlier managers once told me that Citi was a great platform but you need to build your own leadership brand within that umbrella. That would help you and Citi propel forward! This has always stayed with me. Having a brand, a statement of your purpose and vision also enhances your self-image. It helps your workplace too. However, it also provides a distinct edge about recognition of your capabilities as a professional.
It is important to plan your moves and ensure that you have the right platforms to build your profile. Building your profile is a bit like nurturing a plant with the right soil, fodder and nutrients. Working in New York and London and observing seniors I learnt how effective they were at building connections and relationships. It was meticulous planning that went into it, deciding which people to connect with at work and outside work, decoding messages, and assessing where one wanted to take such a professional relationship to and to which extent it would remain mutual.
In February, 2012, I was quite happy being appointed as the Chief HR Officer for the country. Soon after, I got invited to a Senior HR forum in the country. I felt curious and agreed to attend it as my predecessor and team had attended the same earlier and thought well of it. I did some due diligence with other HR heads and receievd positive references about these meetings.
So I went ahead to attend the forum. There were about a hundred people in the audience, and a panel discussion with some HR seniors was to commence. I met some old friends and made some polite conversation, then grabbed a coffee and a cookie and rushed in to get the right table. The panel discussion started and there were some wonderful thoughts shared by the speakers. As I heard them attentively, it gradually dawned on me that we did all o
f this work and probably better and more at Citi. Then why were we not talking about it? Why was I there? No one knew me! It was a true moment of reckoning. I returned to the office, having enjoyed the networking, but a bit confused about what I was doing there listening to something I knew already and not talking about what we do well that would benefit the community. From there on, I decided that for most of these forums, my team would represent Citi at the stage. Therein started the journey to build the leadership brand for the team. Some key steps that worked for us were:
Purpose – messaging: This is key and linked intrinsically to what the company, function and your leadership brand is about. Best if this is all aligned….it all comes down to who you are, what your drivers are and what message you want people to take away. We worked on the HR brand, highlighting our mission consistently and reinforcing it through some really good work being done in-house.
Personally, it was about the focus on the value-add which has been a driver throughout my career. It was all about being explicit here.
Think through and be clear about what have been the achievements, what was done well and how one could help the broader fraternity in the market with one’s contribution. It is important that people internally and externally perceive the same purpose consistently. Any gaps here will impact the credibility.
Can I Have It All Page 14
