Recently, while in Malaysia consulting to a global firm on its reorganization, I was inspired by following story from a manager of one of their mining facilities in China. He exhibited 4 key attributes of leading in the face of change:
- Accept the change
- Take responsibility to deal with the situation
- Engage key stakeholders
- Work hard
It was the end of January and China was virtually shut down. They had a snow storm. Roads were completely closed. The Army had to be called in to shovel main roads. Yes shovel. On top of that it was Chinese New Year. Everyone was heading home for their annual visit to their family.
This facility in China had been trying for 2 years to make a first sale with a specific key customer. The customer finally made a purchase of material. As fate would have it, delivery was to be made in 1 week. How could they do it? The trucks could not travel because the roads were closed. The staff of the facility was mostly gone on vacation.
This manager made it happen. He told me, “I said to myself, what do we have to lose by trying. If we make it, the customer will be very pleased and see how committed we are to them. If we don’t make it, the customer will understand, as the whole country is shut down. So I asked my manager if I could try. He said yes and so I began”
He brought his direct reports together and told them what he wanted to do. The first thing he did was ask his team if they would try to make the order. They told him it was impossible. They said they did not have the manpower and that the roads were closed. Besides, they wanted to go home for Chinese New Year.
He began leading the charge. He told them how important this customer was. He told them that if they could do it, they would win over this key customer. It would bring them a lot of business in the future. He promised to give them time off after this project.
After he got a yes from each of them, he asked them, “What would need to have happen to make this succeed?” They then spent a lot of time brainstorming ideas about what needed to be done. There was much debate and discussion. They came up with a few key ideas.
First, he had his manager contact the government to call in a favor that they were owed. They asked to have certain roads shoveled. Next, they had to find a trucker to transport the material. They had to pay a lot extra to get them to agree to drive with the snow and Chinese new year. But they did. And finally, the managers ran the facility with a skeleton crew.
In the end, the material made it to the customer as promised. They were very impressed and committed an even larger order for the next month. It wasn’t fancy salesmanship that made that sale. It was the can do attitude of one leader, who faced a challenge head on, engaged his team and lead his people to success.
