The Avascent Way: A blend of task and relationship oriented leadership

After my first two weeks of training and my first full week of project work, the dynamic culture of Avascent has become increasingly clear to me. When I was initially going through the interviewing process, something that I kept hearing my interviewers describe was the flat nature of Avascent’s corporate structure. While there are different levels of personnel that provide a clear path of internal advancement, the relationships that exist between all people at the firm is one of camaraderie rather than hierarchy. One thing that has become clear is that while my coworkers are passionate about the subject matter of projects, what keeps them content (and at Avascent for a long time, especially compared to other consulting firms) is the people focused nature that leadership of all levels espouses. On the highest level, within my first week of training the president of the company, Steve Irwin,  had given all new hires a welcome and introduction on the “Avascent Way” a debrief of what Avascent does and what/who it cares about, and reached out to all of the interns on LinkedIn. By the end of the second week which culminated in group practicum presentations to the entire company, Steve had reached out to my group (and I’m sure other groups) personally expressing how impressed he was with the product we ended up providing. This encouragement from the most senior executives and personal guidance that they give speaks highly to the mixture of task-focused and relational styles of leadership that these managers employ. On a more personal level, I’ve seen this personally within my own project group. My project manager, Karen, makes sure to set aside time each Monday for group members to go over personal, non-work related goals that they have for themselves and for us to talk about our weekends before we delve into the specifics of what need to be done this week. In concept, her role is more task-oriented: she is in charge of assigning specific areas of research and analysis to each of the three analysts on my team and frequently checking in with them and guiding their progress. From my personal experience on my project so far, I can tell that project managers at Avascent don’t just guide the final output of a project but also develop team dynamics and strong interpersonal connections.