INTRODUCTION
The focus of this essay is to reflect on the leadership skills gained on the work life balance project at ITL. We have been assigned to work on a “work life balance project” that our industry partner, Intercontinental Trust Limited –ITL wishes to implement for their organization. ITL is an offshore management company which operates in a highly regulated financial environment. It offers a comprehensive range of financial and fiduciary services to international clients based on ethical and socially responsible business practices. It is a rapidly expanding company with an established presence of 15 years in Mauritius. The essence of our teamwork is to bring the knowledge and know- ...view middle of the document...
Our approach to the project is based on a self-directed work team – SDWT. Based on Lawler, Mohrman, & Ledford (1995) concept’s , SDWT is a powerful concept developed since the ancient Roman legion and today approximately 68% companies accounts for the implementation of SDWT approach including Ford, GM, P&G, FedEx.
According to Katzenbach & Smith, SDWT is defined as a small number of people with complementary skills, who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals and approach, for which they hold themselves jointly accountable. Additionally, Berger stated that collaborative self-directed work teams can get complex projects done at faster rates than the traditional boss-worker arrangement, because the decision making process is made faster and more effective in a team. Empowering teams to make decisions about their work also enhances satisfaction. There was no leader as such in our team. In the first phase of the project plan, we mutually defined and agreed on objectives, brainstormed and worked on the way forward to laying down our project plan. Whenever there were disagreements, for example, deciding on the structure of the survey questionnaire, we were opened to discussions and able to think collectively to find a constructive solution to the issue. Based on this approach, our effectiveness as a team was much faster than we could have done individually. A high-performance team is regarded as tight-knit, focused on their goal and have supportive processes that will enable any team member to surmount any barriers in achieving the team's goals.
On the 15th October, the team met to discuss the ideal framework and best practices to be used in the case of ITL. One of the principles that made our team effective was a clear unity of purpose. We remained in constant contact with each other and consulted on every possible occasion. When assigning tasks of the project plan, each section of the project plan presented was broken down and discussed freely and openly within the group until each member had a clear understanding of his objective. We set the direction of the project team according to each one’s strength and weakness. We were also empowered to take decisions to accomplish our tasks so that the team members could function independently. Furthermore, we set standards of ethics and behaviors to achieve positive synergy and to create effective environment. At first we organized a few virtual meetings. Although virtual meetings were fine, it cannot be superseded by face to face meeting. We realized that talking to each other in a real time was more productive. Additionally, we were able to get the feel of each one’s personality. All our face to face meetings were conducted in a relaxed atmosphere after working hours over a cup coffee at Apollo Bramwell Hospital.
As mentioned earlier, we did not have a leader as such for this project but instead each one of us brought their own leadership skills on a rotational role basis. We...
