Week 6 at Cvent: Leader/ follower relationships

As I get further into my internship, my relationship with my manager has stayed pretty much the same. I still have meetings with her a couple times a week to go over the projects I have been assigned and how far I’ve gotten. Given that I am very new and still learning the ropes, I need a more hands-on style of management than my other co-workers who are more experienced. My inexperience also means that I am less trusted than my other team members. Most of them work independently and only come together for the daily meeting and if something specific needs to be discussed, whereas I need more guidance.

This trust difference is also evident in the actions of my manager. She always checks my work 2 or 3 times to make sure what I did was correct. This makes a lot of sense because I am still learning and often make mistakes. Though I know this is part of the process, it is a little but frustrating to have to learn so much so fast and make so many mistakes. I am usually a perfectionist and all of my work gets done at a high level, so it is an adjustment for me to change my expectations of myself to allow for mistakes.

I think one of the strengths of this management style is efficiency. Once I am fully trained and (hopefully) working full time with my team, I will be given more and more able to work alone. This means that I can spend my time working and not just sitting in meetings all day. This means that I can get more done during the day and it increases my efficiency. The hands-off leadership style seems to be best for companies like Cvent that are more individually motivated. At Cvent they tell us that we each have to be the person motivating ourselves to be the best that we can be, and the leadership style (at least of my manager) seems to reflect that. I can tell that my fellow team members are highly efficient and motivated people who are trying to do their best and I think the hand off leadership style does a good job of building that.