Earlier this week I stumbled upon an article titled, "Technology Leader of the Year, Winning with Sustainability." The article is talking about DuPont, yes, DuPont the chemical and material-oriented company. The article is by John Teresko of Industry Week. The article further examines the CEO's viewpoint of sustainability initiatives and what he has done to meet the demand of a sustainable industry and the changing times.
Charles O. Holliday Jr. states, "Putting the environment first doesn't thwart business opportunities, it creates them." Charles has helped DuPont go from a world renowned chemical company to what it is today, a 21st century science company focused on sustainable growth. The article goes on further to explain that although chemistry is such a big part of their success, the addition of biology has brought forth new opportunities for the firm. Because of this, I want to analyze why Charles decided to take a sustainable path recently in DuPont's industry, and figure out what kind of leader he really is.
After reading the article, I believe that Charles O. Holliday Jr. is most definitely a transformational leader among others forms of leadership. Below, I will outline why I think he is a transformational leader by aligning my ideas with the fundamental practices of this form of leadership that is described in our text by Kouzes and Posner's model. The practices are as follows:
Model the Way: leaders need to be clear about their own values and philosophy. In this situation, Charles acts upon this move to sustainability in that it will not only better the industry and environment, but he believes that it would help their sales and revenues by opening many different opportunities for them.
Inspire a Shared Vision: leaders create a compelling vision that can guide people's behavior. For this, Charles and the company understand the changing times and the impact that they are having on the environment, so being inspired to change for the better was already in place.
Challenge the Process: be willing to challenge the process and change the status quo. Charles really didn't know what they were getting into until they figured out their strategy to enter into their sustainable efforts.
Enable Others to Act: build trust with others and build collaboration. Because DuPont has so many constituents, Charles and partners had to trust each other in order to build on their relationships and to be successful in their goals to reach sustainability.
Encourage the Heart: reward others for their accomplishments. In this, Charles has not rewarded too many people besides letting them be a part of this huge project that DuPont is undergoing. If in fact that they reach their goals by 2015, their will be a lot of opportunities opening for DuPont, which in turn will allow extensive rewards to the employees, partners, and shareholders. (everyone has to be on board)
As we can see, Charles O. Holliday really is a transformational leader. He has taken this chemical producing company, and is forming it into a leader in sustainability, especially in their industry. To add, he has set forth goals and time lines for the transformation of his company in which they are encouraged to meet by 2015. Thus, Charles is a transformational leader because he has attempted to set out to empower followers and nurture them in to change. By doing so, Charles has created a completely changed company, as well as added consciousness to the individuals within the company and among their constituents.
Do you think that Charles O. Holliday is a transformational leader? If not, what type of leadership style do you think he portrays, or if he is a leader at all? Is there anything that I missed that would show that he is a transformational leader? If so, then what?
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Jeffrey Parrish
Jeff,
ReplyDeleteI think you are absolutely right about Holliday being a transformational leader. It is definitely worth mentioning how critical it is to have transformational leadership in the chemical production industry, because it has so far to go until social responsibility. Historically, his is one of the most environmentally detrimental industries we have and support. In this way, it strengthens your argument that he is transformational because of the great changes he enacted at DuPont. In addition, I think it is worth mentioning his alignment with authentic leadership, as he appears to be leading the effort based on his vision of "the right thing to do." Authentic leadership is really a learning process, and it sounds like Holliday has really made a commendable effort to align his values with those that will bring a company that was not previously known for environmental stewardship well into the realm of social responsibility.
-Kyle Hines
Jeff,
ReplyDeleteI agree with most of what you have written. I happen to enjoy your insight quite a bit. However, I have an issue with Kouzes and Pozner's "Inspiring a Shared Vision."
According to Kouzes and Pozner, by inspiring a shared vision, leaders and their followers have an idea as to what will be the future result. Wouldn’t that be nice? To know the future and the results of our actions would make for great business. But that is not how the world really works.
I challenge your view by looking through the complexity leadership theory lens and how leadership is defined in the theory. In complexity leadership theory, organizations are called complex adaptive systems. These are systems that are made up of a large number of diverse, active elements that have the ability to adapt to their environment.
In this theory, leaders are not directors or controllers of predictable situations (aka, what you have outlined in your post). Rather, leaders are enablers of emergent, self-organizing systems. These emergent self-organizing systems are organized through the actions of interdependent agents who exchange information, take actions, and continuously adapt to feedback.
Leaders in these systems enable emergent, self-organizing systems by disrupting existing patterns, encouraging novelty, and through sense giving.
Aside from the latter of this jargon, I am more concerned with the fact that results are not predictable. Hence why I used complexity leadership theory to challenge your view. I wish results could be predicted, especially in this context, but it’s just not likely.
Posted by: Michael Condupa