Providence, R.I.--Two local business leaders, Paul Rich of Deepwater Wind and Jon Duffy of Duffy & Shanley, spoke to a group of Providence College students on the importance of inclusive leadership.
The pair emphasized the human aspects of the business culture on Thursday, October 22 during a meeting of PC's Master of Business Administration (MBA) Program's Leaders on Leadership course.
During each meeting of the Leaders on Leadership class, local business executives outline their views on leadership. Each business leader is asked to convey several messages, including articulating their personal definition or practical understanding of leadership and outlining their personal beliefs about leading effectively.
Wind power leader calls for singular vision
Paul Rich serves as the chief development officer for Deepwater Wind, a leader in offshore wind power development. Rich oversees the proposed development of the company's wind farms off of Block Island and in Narragansett Bay.
He told the class that he developed an early understanding of leadership when an officer in the U.S. Navy by recognizing an inherent difference between managing and leading.
"Leading is not delegating, that's managing," he stated. "Instead, leading is taking workplace activity and moving it towards a goal or series of goals."
Rich believed when true leadership occurs these goals are not individually realized but, instead, they are realized as a group. Thus, leaders should create a feeling of inclusiveness by showing their own humanity in the workplace.
He emphasized the importance of authenticity when trying to create this inclusive environment. Effective leadership often calls for tough decisions and if a leader's convictions falter, so too does the ability to reach goals, he said.
Rich said accountability and respect are crucial to creating an environment in which everyone works together to achieve a set of goals. Accountability lends itself to fairness and equality, which bring out the best effort in employees, while respect fosters mutual respect and builds relationships, he said. Rich believed true leadership involves a constant self-awareness and a consistent attempt to spread authenticity, accountability, and empathy throughout the workforce.
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Jon Duffy recounted how he became president of Duffy & Shanley, a synchronized marketing company based in Providence, at the peak of the "dotcom bubble" in 2000. With the events of September 11, 2001, and the ensuing economic panic, Duffy said he realized a change within his organizational structure needed to occur in order for the company to remain viable.
Duffy developed a "white paper" in which he outlined the foundational characteristics of his organization that would allow it continued success. The four foundational characteristics of employees that he indentified in this paper were passion, intuition, curiosity, and responsibility.
To do this, he enhanced Duffy & Shanley's competitive edge by drawing upon the individualism and creativeness within each of his employees. Duffy implemented policies to make the environment as democratic as possible and a firm where "the best idea won" regardless of the creator.
Duffy fostered such a dramatic shift by opening communication channels, holding an organization-wide meeting to discuss his new policies, and encourage future discussion. He underlined the key to effective leadership and said that moving the organization toward its goal was to include everyone equally in the process.
As a result, he continues to create an atmosphere where openness to new ideas and teamwork are compulsory.
However, Duffy said he knew such intangible measures only went so far. To cultivate the free exchange of ideas, he instituted structural changes to create an "atypical workplace." The use of roundtables for client meetings was one such example of change.
Duffy explained, "The roundtable grants everyone a frequent voice where ideas are conceived with no preconceived notions of hierarchy."
On a personal level, Duffy cited his Roman Catholic education as the overriding foundation of his leadership, attributing to it a lifelong pursuit of compassion. This moral framework only reinforces opinions reflective of past business experiences that leadership is often most successful when inclusive, he said.
-Jake Bissaillon