Week 3: Theories/Leader & Follower Relationships
This past week a few interns and I had the pleasure to have lunch with John, who is head of wealth management. John oversees the trading floor, the teams within it, and our managers. In addition to being in charge of our divisions, he runs the Latin America IPS branch. During this lunch with John, I was able to ask him his opinion on leadership – what his philosophy is and how he balances managing so many different components at work on top of making time for his personal life.
Through his response, his leadership style sounded like a mix of transformational leadership and LMX theory. He said due to his busy schedule, he tries to delegate to people he feels can handle the responsibility of the position and empower them to work hard and reach company goals. He stressed the importance of his relationships with people and how important open communication and collaboration between the teams are. He said he tries to remain as accessible as he can and have an open door so his “followers” can always find him and come to him with any problems. One of his other main points was that leadership is about service. Even though he’s one of the most important people on the floor and everyone is working under him, he has a responsibility to work for them as well, and always keep the best interest of the people and the company in mind at all times.
Lastly, he says it’s important for him to be vulnerable and have his colleagues trust him. That way, he can give feedback, whether good or bad, and his coworkers know that it’s coming from a good place and will want to improve. I thought Johns response was really good, he seemed to tie in almost everything I’ve learned about leadership over the past few years in Jepson. From asking other people on my team, he seems like he cares a lot about everyone on the floor and wants them to succeed. His response seemed genuine and that he acts on what he says.
I’ve been very impressed so far with UBS and how accessible the leaders of the company have made themselves to us interns and how much they seem to care to get to know us and make sure we are learning. It’s been an incredible opportunity to speak with them and hear their insights into the company and ask them whatever questions we might have.
Sounds like a really interesting lunch and a really thoughtful individual. As you’ve invoked transformational leadership, I would encourage you to think of concrete examples you observe/experience that illustrate the factors (inspirational motivation, idealized influence, intellectual stimulation, and individualized consideration). I realize you talked about John – who is not your supervisor – as a transformational leader, but you may find others you have more direct contact with who also embody/employ this type of leadership. The more concrete examples you have that illustrate concepts/theories you discuss, the better equipped you’ll be to complete the academic assignments this fall.