CEO SPECIAL .......................‘Encourage strategic thinking, innovation’

 ‘Encourage strategic thinking, innovation’

WHILE A MANAGER, IS FOCUSED ON MANAGING AND SUSTAINING CERTAIN ASSIGNMENTS AND TASKS, A LEADER MUST MOTIVATE AND BIND THE TEAMS TOGETHER

Deepak Mehrotra joined London-based publishing and education company, Pearson, as the managing director of its India business in 2013, after spearheading domestic smartphone-giant, Micromax, for two years. Mehrotra tells HT that an effective leader must unlock unrealised talent.

Excerpts:

How do you define a leader?

A leader is a dealer in hope. The primary role of a leader is to create an energising vision, which the rest of the organisation can rally around. I believe that an effective leader must unlock the ocean of unrealised talent and directly link it to the achievement of an organisation’s strategic goal.

As the leader of a global organisation, how do you cultivate leaders?

At Pearson, we nurture talent by providing them an environment that’s conducive for learning and growth. By using initiatives ranging from talent reviews to 360-degree feedback, mentoring the talent pool to putting emerging leaders on stretch assignments and role changes, and introducing a global framework for uniform leadership development practices, we focus on developing a talent pool of leader, who are global in outlook and local in approach.

Can leadership be learnt? How can a manager become a leader?

While some people may be more naturally inclined to lead, good leadership qualities can be acquired and nurtured. While as a manager, one is focused on managing and sustaining certain assignments and tasks, a leader must motivate and bind the teams together, make them productive and aligned to the organisation’s short-and-long-term goals, while ensuring personal growth of individuals.

I believe self-awareness and emotional resilience, which is the very core of insightful leaders, can be enhanced through various tools, techniques and education.

What are three key attributes of a leader?

I believe Pearson’s leadership attributes sum it up precisely: Leading self — being ethical, courageous and always learning; Leading others — inspiring and developing more leaders and building active partnerships that promote collaboration and teamwork; Leading the business — being customerfocused, delivering for today and innovating for tomorrow.

What has been the biggest leadership challenge you’ve faced?

When I took charge at an Indian mobile device company, it was struggling due to competitive onslaught, inventory pressure, low trade confidence, low internal competencies and processes, and was barely profitable.

Setting up a seven-fold growth agenda and a vision of becoming the first billiondollar Indian mobile company in less than two years energised the team and the promoters to go through the painful revamp. I invested organisational time, effort and energy on building processes and capability, strong customer service and customer connect and orientation for the brand. Rest as they say is history.

What is your leadership mantra?

My personal leadership style involves empowering individuals, encouraging strategic thinking and innovation to bring focus and enhance performance. I get a great sense of satisfaction to know that over the last few years all my direct reports moved up by minimum two levels, in turn ensuring growth of their teams.

What is the biggest leadership lesson you have learnt?

I am guided by Ross Perot’s dictum, ‘Talk is cheap. Words are plentiful. Deeds are precious.’ It’s important to lead by example. It builds trust, respect and a sense of belonging.

It’s important to have an open channel of communication between a leader and his team so that their efforts are mobilised in a single direction.

Who is your role model? Why?

Though there are many people who have influenced me, a legendary personality who has inspired me a lot is Abraham Lincoln. Like an agent of change, he led his country through a phase of huge moral, constitutional and political crisis.

What is the best leadership decision that you have taken?

I once led a team of underdogs in the southern telecom circle of a leading telecom company. I worked with the same team to appreciate, inspire and develop their self-belief in the capability to not only excel but to gain market leadership. As a result, that circle became the first circle across the telecom industry, where an 1,800-MHz operator became a market leader.

What is the worst leadership decision that you have taken?

This is about my first settlement negotiation with a union group, as a general manager. I didn’t prepare the core team well. We didn’t do enough homework on the possible scenarios that could emerge and our responses, which resulted in almost a lockout situation. The learning from that situation has stayed with me till date.

HT 141113