monica1901-blog

[monica1901-blog]

Leadership blog: Week 1 Monica Srivastava

Think of a time when you were in a leadership situation.  

a.             What was the experience like for you?

b.             What did you learn from it?

The most exciting time of my leadership role was as Associate Vice President of Customer Engagement department in SBI Life Insurance Co. Ltd., India. I was in charge of a team who looked after the customer care centre and was also involved in retaining existing customers through engagement programs. Besides these, there were other functions as well. The most challenging part for us as a team was to handle irate customers. Most of the queries which were escalated to us by the call centre agents required a high level of empathy and knowledge.

It is challenging for everyone to be positive and remain calm in this everyday situation where all customers are venting out their anger on us. In such a case, my leadership played an important role. We used to have a 15 minutes morning meeting before we started the work. I used to keep everyone positive by encouraging them on their excellent work and motivating them to surpass all expectations. Creating a positive environment was a successful strategy as it helped teammates to perform beyond expectations.

I encouraged my team to learn more and be better equipped to handle all customer queries. I organised inter-departmental training for my team to improve their knowledge about various processes at different departments. It gave them a lot of confidence in dealing with irate customers.

It was an amazing learning experience for me. My team was my biggest strength, and I understood the power of team building. We worked together to bring in new ideas for retaining and engaging customers. We gave an exemplary performance by maintaining a 98% customer satisfaction rate. Developing skills and knowledge of the team members also contributed towards our extraordinary performance.

2. Describe your leadership strengths and skills, as you currently know them. Where possible, align these with specific examples.

My three significant leadership strengths are developer, activator and positivity. As I am a developer, I encouraged my team to learn more about the process and procedures of the other departments and keep them updated about the latest policies. It helped them to understand and answer the customer queries in a much better way and scale up the customer satisfaction level.

Positivity is also my strongest point, and I used it entirely in my professional career. I kept my team motivated and involved them in all decision-making activities due to which I developed trust and honesty among my team members. I kept motivating my team members to give their best output by giving them monthly rewards and recognition.

I initiated a lot of new projects and successfully implemented them. I am an activator and like to jump on new ideas and start planning meticulously towards its execution. Few of such projects were implementing Chatbot, exclusive policy kit for High Net Worth clients, and setting up a dedicated cell for handling queries and complaints of High Net Worth clients.

3.    What are the leadership strengths, skills or characteristics that you would like to develop? Why?

I need to work more on communication skills and conflict management. I think these are the two most much-needed skills for the leadership role. Effective communication is vital in bringing out the required output from the team. It is also essential for expressing ideas and vision with your team and superiors and plays an important role in the success of any project. It is also necessary in resolving conflicts and building a strong team.

Conflict can occur in any situation and is unavoidable. It affects the productivity of the employees and can be a demotivating factor for the team members. Timely resolution of the conflict is very important for successful implementation of any plan. Therefore, it becomes necessary in this fast-paced environment to learn conflict management and effective communication.

[monica1901-blog]

Leadership Final Blog: Monica Srivastava, ID 991521076

This is your final reflection and blog for the course overall. It is an extensive reflection on your course experience, with detailed reference to the specific weekly chapters and experiences and what you learned about yourself and others during this time.  Discuss the impact of this learning on your life and future. What specifically has helped. You should reflect on your specific leadership moments of revelation.  You can use all of the personal reflection blogs that have been done previously and perhaps remark on what has evolved in you, your new perspective, your new or renewed motivation and expectations.

My leadership journey started with my joining of SBI Life in 2003. SBI Life is a joint venture between State Bank of India and BNP Paribas, France. It specializes in Bancassurance model in Insurance. It was a learning experience for me as it was my first job and I got an opportunity to learn about insurance. With my diligent work, I was promoted as Assistant Manager after two years and was leading a team in Group Operations.

In the initial days, the company was establishing itself through Bancassurance Channel. Insurance was a new concept to the bankers who were being trained to sell insurance. I felt privileged to be a part of the training team and educate them on the operations area like filling up proposal form, policy servicing and so on.

Gradually, I was climbing up the ladder and expanding my horizons through experiences in various departments like policy servicing, renewals, underwriting and so on. Finally, after 13 years, I got an opportunity to join Corporate Centre as Associate Vice President, Customer Engagement. It was here that I saw my seniors (Vice President, Senior Vice President, COO) were still upgrading their knowledge with new courses, and this motivated me to enhance my skills as I realized that learning is a continuous process.

I joined the Business Analysis and Process Management course at Sheridan to enhance my business knowledge and analytical skills. I desire to move into consulting business after completing my course. The leadership module in the course came as a journey of self-realization.

On the first day of attending my class itself, I was amazed to know that by only focusing on my strength I can be successful. Gallup’s strength finder gave my top five strengths as Developer, Activator, Positivity, Relator, Arranger. I knew that I had skills to develop people, and I am a positive person but didn’t realize that they can lead me to success. Gallup’s strength finder helped me how to use these strengths to the fullest. It emphasized how to negate your weakness by finding teammates who have your weakness as their strengths.

Myers Briggs was another test that helped me to understand myself better. Now, I know why I behave in a certain way and what needs to be done to improve upon personal and professional relationships.

Another, valuable lesson that I learned was how to build a high performing team. From my past experiences I have learned that managing a high performing team is very difficult. There are times when there are conflicts among team members over certain issues. Leader’s role is to manage conflicts and keep the team together and make them work towards a common goal.

Conflict management taught us how to create a win-win situation through collaborating style. I always found it hard to handle conflicts. Initially, I found myself in an assertive style. Now, I have developed a more intent listening skill and give value to other’s opinion in a group. Working in an authoritative role for more than ten years has made me more of a controlling person but now working with the college group has made me more patient and understanding.

My learning experience also includes giving constructive feedback. It is essential for building a cohesive team. The team should know their weak areas and also learn to overcome it. I also learned that how important is communication in building a cohesive team and building a trust among the team.

Case study, industry leader meeting and some powerful videos prodded me to think about how I can add value to the society. How can my journey be heroic? I always wanted to be an entrepreneur, but due to circumstances, I did not get a chance to delve into it. Now, I think I have the knowledge and the courage to chase my dreams and be a heroine of my leadership journey.

[monica1901-blog]

Leadership Blog (Week 8); First  Leadership Adventure Trail Monica Srivastava; ID 991521076

You have just completed your first Leadership Adventure Trail. This has exposed you to many aspects of real world leadership including team development, critical thinking, followership, not knowing, communication/presentation skills, etc. Based on the past three weeks respond to the following questions:

    What was the most important lesson that you learned generally about leadership from the first Leadership Trail and how might you use that in the future?

The leadership trail taught me to look at a situation critically. We started the leadership trail by looking the case through the problem-solving template. The problem-solving template is a step by step guide in understanding a problem, creating ideas and coming to a conclusion with the best solution to the problem. We used the problem-solving template to arrive at a recommended solution for the King Conductor company.

I learnt a lot about high performing team during the leadership trail. For a team to become high performing, they need to have SMART Goals. SMART goals are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time specific. This will also help in building a cohesive team as they are working towards a common goal and are clear of their roles in it. We worked with SMART goals and were able to deliver the ideas in the class effectively.

In high performing team, members should respect each other’s idea and keep the team above the individual work. There will always be conflict in ideas as each individual due to the difference in knowledge and experience.   We too had a lot of discussion about the issue of whether the motivation was the issue or conflict was the issue. Then, there was a difference of opinion about the alternative solution for the case. Finally, we concluded through mutual agreement.

I realised the importance of facilitator in the team to resolve issues. A facilitator is a discussion leader for the group. When a group is interacting on a topic, thousands of ideas come to mind. All views have a positive and a negative side to it, and that needs to be discussed. Facilitator collates all ideas and initiates discussions.

    What was a key lesson that you might have learned about you personally as a leader? How might you use that to develop your leadership ability in the future?

Leadership session has been very beneficial. It is a kind of self-exploring journey. I have handled various profiles where I was leading a team, but I was still ignorant about my leadership strengths. The Gallup report was very helpful in highlighting my leadership skills.

From my school days, I was taught to focus on my weaknesses and try to improve upon it. Gallup’s strength finder opened a new world for me by saying that instead of focusing on our weakness, we should strive to improve upon our strengths. It also described ways to improve each strength.

The valuable lesson that I learnt was that building a high performing team is crucial in a Leadership role. As I have worked in a leadership role, I could understand the importance of team building. Team building starts by choosing the right team, building confidence among the team members, giving the right direction to the team through goal setting and measuring their performance. It also gave me a chance to understand conflict management which is inevitable in any group.

After working with SBI Life as Associate Vice President, I understand it was how difficult to manage a team of high performing individuals. It becomes difficult when the team members are from different departments and have vast experience or knowledge.

This team building will help me in handling such situations. Now, I know that the most crucial factor in team building is trust and you can build it by intentful listening. When the team members have confidence in the leader, they give their best performance. Leaders can define roles and responsibility among the team members and create SMART goals to measure team performance.

I have also learnt about giving constructive feedback. It is the most challenging part. Most people don’t like to hear feedback about them and sometimes don’t take it positively. Giving constructive feedback is an art, which is helpful for both the employee as well as for the manager. By receiving feedbacks, a person gets a chance to improve upon herself and manager could be benefitted by her improved performance. I am learning to give constructive feedback.

    What do you think you need to do to really grow in both competence and confidence to achieve the level of personal and professional leadership that is important to you?

To achieve the level of personal and professional leadership,  I would like to be myself. Leaders should be authentic. After taking the Gallup’s test, I was able to see my top strengths. My top three strengths are a developer, activator and positivity. I think that these have helped me in the past and will remain in focus for self-improvement. I want to enhance my top tree skills to become a good leader.

I have already led a high performing team while I was working for SBI Life, India. I could say that my team was high performing as we won many accolades for being in top positions in Renewal Collection, 100% maturity payment and so on. I also see myself as a confident leader because we implemented many new initiatives which played a significant role in our success.

However, I would like to work more on Intentful listening and networking with other leaders as it will further intensify my strengths. With intentful listening, I will be able to build more trust among my team members. As an activator, I am quick to get into action, so being with the other leaders who have brilliant ideas will give me the enthusiasm to work on their ideas.

    What did you learn about leadership communication and the ability to effectively communicate and present your ideas/vision/ plan from your and the other teams’ presentations on Leadership Trail #1?

Communication plays an important in leadership. To be effective, one should be presentable and have clarity of thoughts. I also learned how to make an impressive presentation. I learnt from the mistake which other groups made like including too many pictures or big pictures that draws the attention of the audience from the content.

I also learned about connecting with the audience during the presentation. The speaker should set an authoritative tone and also actively engage the audience through expressions. Time management is also essential during the presentation and it should be done in a time bound fashion. Practice plays an important role in the delivery of presentation and this was quite evident in my team's presentation.

    Being curious and being able to ask relevant, open-ended questions is a key leadership skill.  How might you prepare yourself for the interview with your second leader to ask key open-ended questions?  Write what that (those) questions might be here, in advance of the interview.

I want to ask about the company’s current market situation and also all sales managers contribution to the company’s business. From this, I can get an idea who is close to Charlotte and can be an excellent competitor to her.

I would also like to know about the budget of the company, which they are planning to spend on the other employees.

I am also interested in knowing how feasible it is for their company to make changes in the pay structure as suggested by us.

[monica1901-blog]

Leadership blog (Week 7): Meeting the Adventure Leader. Monica Srivastava,Student ID: 991521076

1.    What have I learned from the meeting we held with the adventure leader who visited our class this week?

We met the CEO of the King Conductor. The meeting was very informative in knowing the different aspects of the company which were not clear from the case. We discussed majorly two topics with the industry leader. One was related to sales structure and other was HR policies in the company. There was a lot of conflict among the staff members due to Charlotte getting higher pay commission. They were demotivated due to her high earnings.

The adventure leader took us through the companies’ structure, values and different policies of the company. The company’s targets were very ambitious, and they were targeting to be No.1 in the industry. Therefore, they will be paying attention to the sales and making the sales pay structure more attractive and motivating. 

They have excellent human resource policies prevailing in their company. They have a balanced scorecard for all positions, and the same is being reviewed periodically. The promotions are also based on the employee’s performance. Employees are rewarded and appreciated for their extraordinary work. They only lack ways to handle conflicts in the organization. They were not having any town hall meetings to address the grievances of the employees or any other such activities.

It was an enriching experience for me.  It is very challenging to lead a team of high performing individuals and it needs to be balanced out well. The team should have high goals and a strategy to achieve it. Team members should be kept motivated so that they should work enthusiastically. The team performance will be the greatest factor in the success of a high performing team. There will always be conflict among the team members because everyone is an individual and have their own opinions but the conflicts should be dealt with empathy.

[monica1901-blog]

Monica Srivastava, Student ID 991521076, Reflective Blog, Team

What is one thing that I learned about leadership this week and how might I use this as part of my personal leadership development?

This week was a quite a learning experience. We discussed the team memorandum of understanding and problem-solving template. Team Memorandum is the first and the essential step towards leadership. Team Memorandum is a step by step guide to forming a right team, establish leadership, and building a cohesive team.

I would use the memorandum of understanding in my personal leadership development. This step by step guide will help me to build a high performing team and will also take my leadership to the next level.

Choosing a right team is very important in the leadership role. The team should be of the right size, and the team members should have mutual trust and respect among each other.  I would use all the steps mentioned in Memorandum of Understanding in forming a high performing team.

Then I would try to build a cohesive team through setting goals and performance parameters. I would also assign responsibilities and encourage teams to discuss openly and share constructive feedbacks to avoid conflicts.

2. After working with my team, what are three things that I have learned about becoming a high performing team?

A high performing team has a purpose,  trust, accountability and commitment. Though the team members of high performing team are strong individuals with different skills & talents they have a lot of trust among each other. Working on the team MOU made me understand my team better.

Our team was a high performing team because we had a lot of trust among each other. We supported each other in the times of difficulty. We all worked together as a team towards a common goal or assignment. We had respect for each other’s ideas and suggestions.  Everyone in the team was given an opportunity to express her ideas freely, and the team took a collective decision.

Firstly, I learnt that trust is the most important thing. The things work well when the team members have mutual trust & respect for each other. If the trust prevails in the team, the team supports each other and can work towards a common goal.

Secondly, goal setting is vital in the high performing team. The team should have a common goal. This will keep the team united. Goal setting & performance measurement also plays a vital role in the team's development and achieving goals. Success is a step by step process. Reviewing teams on a regular basis will help the leader to take his team towards the targeted goal and making her team a high performing team.

Thirdly, feedback is critical in making the team a high performing team. Sharing constructive feedback is very important. I believe that team members should know their weakness or the shortcomings and take feedbacks positively. They should look for ways to improve upon it.

3. The next time I am in a team what are the top three things that I would bring to the team to help make it a high performing team?

The next time I am in a team, the first thing I would do is to define goals and objectives for the team. It will provide vision and direction to the team. The high performing team should have clear goals and objectives to work upon.

As I am a developer and would like each member to develop and grow, I would allow each member to contribute in the goal setting. If the goal setting is done collaboratively, each team members owns the targets and try to work towards it. The team becomes more accountable for their work. This ownership leads towards the success.

I would also try to build a cohesive team by making trust among each other and encouraging them to work towards goals. I would do regular reviews to create commitment and peer accountability In the group.  It also helps in building trust in each other's strengths.

Conflict is unavoidable in the group and to handle conflict, sharing feedback is the most excellent tool. I would also encourage team members to share constructive feedback.   Conflict arises when there is are disagreements in the team. I would support the team to discuss and try to come to a conclusion mutually. This will promote positivity in the group and will make the team a high performing team.

[monica1901-blog]

Leadership Blog - Week 5, Monica Srivastava- ID 991521076

We have spent a couple of weeks learning about and applying a Problem Solving Template as a process to work through leadership challenges to come to a thorough solution that is implementable.

Q.  What do you think are the advantages and disadvantages of using a template to work through an operational or leadership issue?

Problem Solving Template is a step by step solution to a problem. It helps to analyse a problem and work out solutions in a very systematic way. It focuses on various issues in the problem and allows us to explore ideas or solution to a given problem. It helps you to evolve through the process and conclude.

The disadvantage of problem-solving template is that it is a pure individualist view. What one person perceives it may not be the same for another person. Hence the solutions may differ, and it will also depend upon the organisation’s view towards the even for acceptance.

Q.  When you applied the template on the cases what did you find challenging and what did you find beneficial?

The most challenging part was to provide with the solution and the implementation part. While analysing a situation it easy and you have all facts and figures available to do the analysis. Therefore, it becomes easy to identify the problem areas. Providing solutions is a very tactful task. All the pros and cons to be weighed before any conclusion is drawn. Implementation should be very strategic, as success depends on how well an idea is implemented.

The most beneficial part was identifying the core leadership issues as most problem stems from it. I believe that most of the issues can be resolved with the right leadership attitude. Finding out the critical leadership issues and fixing them through setting goals was the most constructive part of it.

Q.  It is critical for leaders to be able to lead teams in clarifying core issues and identifying innovative ideas to resolve issues. In what ways do you think this template accomplishes this?

This template helps us to identify the core leadership issues in a problem. Almost 90% of the problems are due to these leadership issues. A problem is resolved if it is dealt with the right attitude. A lot of problems are linked with poor leadership communication, Inauthentic leadership, underperforming team and so on. It gives us a direction to solve a problem.

Q. When you review the 14 Leadership topics outlined in the Problem Solving Template, which is the one that you think is a critical leadership requirement? Why?

I feel ‘Leadership communication’ is the most critical requirement. Majority of the problems are due to miscommunication. Either the manager does not appropriately understand the goals and strategies, or it is not appropriately communicated to the team. If everybody in the organisation is in line, success is inescapable. Intentful listening is also a part of communication which plays a vital role in building trust among the team and making it a High performing team.

[monica1901-blog]

Leadership Blog : Week 4 Monica Srivastava, ID 991521076

1.    Which leadership area are you naturally drawn to? Why? How might you use one of your strengths to be a more effective leader in this area?

I am more inclined towards Authentic Leadership & Team Development.  Authentic Leadership forms the basis of leadership. Leaders should be truthful to gain the confidence of their team. It is the trust in the leader that binds the team together.  

Team Development is another leadership quality that attracts me. A high performing team is a powerhouse and will always be a winner. To create a high performing team leader should be able to guide their team towards a common goal, make them accountable and build trust in each other. This high performing team can produce highly successful results.

My strength as a Developer can help me achieve the above goal.  As I am a developer, I always encourage my team members to enhance their skills, to take up challenges and grow in life. By showing trust in them, I can make them more accountable and guide them towards a common goal. As I give enough space and encouragement to my team members to enhance their skills and talent, they develop a trust in me. Being trustworthy make me an authentic leader, who can instil confidence in her team too.  

2.    Which leadership area do you not really understand? What is it that you don’t understand specifically?  Do some online research and find an answer to what you don’t understand.

Virtual leadership is one such area that is very difficult to understand. A leader can influence or make a difference when he is present. People are more likely to follow a person whom they can see around. Physical presence makes much difference in managing conflicts and understanding your team. It is not clear to me that how virtual leadership can make an impact.

From the research, I came to know that many workplaces have made a shift to virtual place and virtual leadership have come into action. Virtual leaders have strong communication skills as they are in a distant place and they need to communicate their expectation and goals to the team effectively. They use technology to communicate such meetings over skype or teleconferencing. They trust their teams more and are an active listener as they are far away and do not have any idea of the real situation. These skills will help them to take better decisions.

[monica1901-blog]

I was a part of a high performing team when I was working for SBI Life as New Business, Head at Processing Centre. Processing Centre is a hub of operations at the regional level. There were around 14 regions all over India. SBI Life as a company took a target of achieving 100% maturity payments on or before the due date. A contest was launched from Head Office. All regions were excited as it was an opportunity to showcase themselves as a high performing region in front of the top management. Immediately, our State Head called a meeting of all the head of departments and asked them to come together as a team towards a goal of being in the top 3 regions in achieving 100% maturity target. Though maturity was taken care by claims department, all other departments such as new business, policy servicing, groups and team at the branches came together to achieve the target of being in Top 3 regions PAN India.  All team members put in their best efforts in contacting customers, collecting documents and processing them. There were some special efforts that were made to achieve the target and finally, we achieved the target and were ranked 3rd in the contest. 

Our region was the among the top regions in volumes PAN India. The data of matured policies was voluminous. The data was immediately divided among the various departments for followup. I was in charge of the New Business department at the Processing Centre. My new business team started contacting customers from the database and requesting them to submit documents in the nearby branch. I also played the role of a facilitator to the team. I was sending updated reports and floating internal contest to keep the team motivated and focused towards the goal. The reports were viewed in the weekly review meetings and new strategies were built around it. 

Looking back at the team, I would not like to change anything as the team was cohesive. There was a commitment towards the goal, peer accountability was also visible as all team members were from different departments, but they came together for a common goal. Each team member was accountable towards the target. The team used to review the performance weekly and give constructive feedback. For example, if a customer was non-contactable after a lot of follow-ups, suggestions were given to visit the customer's place or bring in sales team intervention to close the case. This helped the team to take corrective action and built winning strategy towards the goal. The team was having trust in each other's capabilities and all of them put in 100% effort for achieving the goal. The huge customer base was divided among the team members for followup. Therefore, there was also a delegation of work, which was done at the beginning of the project. This was the reason why the team could achieve its target within the given timelines. 

I would choose the mixed approach of competing and avoiding. If I firmly believe that any idea that will work best towards the organizational goal, I will try to put it assertively backed with the reasons to support it. If the other person is not cooperative and not willing to listen to it. I will avoid it for the moment and go with the flow of the team. But I will wait for the best time to put up my point of view. This helps me to avoid any confrontations. I think it is the best way to deal with interdepartmental or other conflicts in an organization or the outside world. 

I need to practice more intentful listening while working in a future team. This will help me to bond better with my team and build a strong trustful relationship. As trust is the foundation of leadership. A team full of trust and confidence will always perform better and give more than expected results. 

[monica1901-blog]

My biggest strengths

The most inspiring thing of the personal assessment done in the last class was to identify strengths. We came to know that a person can be more successful, if he focusses on his strengths more than his weakness. We have always been brought up to think that focusing on one’s weakness will make a person more successful in life. This session was an eye opener and a myth buster.

Sometimes it becomes very difficult in identifying one’s biggest strengths. After taking the Gallup’s test of strength finder, I came to know about my biggest strengths. I am a Developer and Activator.  Positivity is another biggest strength. Though unknowingly, I was always working ahead in my life with these strengths. I was completely unaware of this. Being a developer, I am quick to identify the potential in my team mates. I always encourage my team to enhance their skills and grow in their areas. I am an Activator. I am quick to get into action in challenging times and support my team to achieve desired result. I always create a happy and positive environment around myself and among my teammates, as I believe that it always gives you better result.

I think it will definitely improve my leadership skills as after knowing them, I will focus more on these strengths to build a strong team. I can also team up with people who have my weakness as their biggest strength. This will help me in making impeccable team.

In this week, I would be focusing more on my strengths and my personality traits. This will help me understand myself and my group members better. It will definitely help me in getting better outputs during group discussions and group work.

Being a developer and activator, I will try to surround myself with creativity people, so that I can help them move their ideas and also be with most influential decision makers, who can help me in activation of ideas.

[monica1901-blog]

My leadership Journey

I was working with SBI Life Insurance Company and I was heading a Regional Underwriting Unit. I had around 20 people working in my team. SBI Life Insurance Company is a No.1 private player in Insurance Industry in India. My unit was handling the biggest region of India and had very high business volumes. The region was fighting for its No. 1 position PAN India and was pushing sales very hard. The ultimate pressure came to the RUU team for billing the business and issuing the policies. We had long working hours and were even working on non-working days.  Keeping the team motivated towards the desired goals was a huge challenge. This incident gave me insights that with leadership role comes a huge responsibility of taking care of the team members and giving maximum output with limited resources. I learnt that if people are dealt with empathy and trust they are most likely to give better results. I trusted my team with skills and outcomes and they completed the task well.

Finally, region achieved its desired target and I knew my team management skill led to the desired outcome . Communication is also one of the biggest strengths of a leader. I understood the vision of my superiors and communicated the same to the team which helped us in achieving the target. Trust was another factor that contributed towards our success and the team’s faith in me helped them in delivering as per our expectations.

Communication plays an important role in today’s business world. It is very important that how well you can present the expectations of senior management to your team. I would definitely like to enhance my communication skills.