为什么说你不该像“教父”那样当领导

    联邦快递的成功故事

    联邦快递的管理者与员工一直在践行该公司的“紫色承诺”：“一切以客户为中心”。我曾请该公司CEO弗里德·史密斯谈谈该公司员工如何做到在面对挑战时依旧以公司使命为荣。他向我讲述了一名女员工的故事。我暂且称她为吉尔。吉尔得知，有一单发往加拿大的包裹在途中严重受损，一直未送达目的地，里面装的是两辆婴儿学步车，在加拿大买不到替代品。

    弗里德说，尽管吉尔并没有参与这位客户的前期交易，但她还是“承担起个人责任，在当地找到并购买了两辆婴儿学步车，准备好相关文件，安排了发货，并一直监督运送情况，直到货物送达客户手中。”员工代表着整个公司的形象，吉尔认为，她有责任让客户收到期待的货物。弗里德总结道：“联邦快递竭尽全力为她服务，令这位客户非常高兴。”

    如果你是这位客户，你难道不会向你的朋友同事讲述这家公司为你提供的悉心周到的服务吗？如果下一次你需要寄送包裹，你会选择和推荐其他人选择哪家公司呢？

    当我将这个故事告诉Baker & McKenzie律师事务所全球人力资源总监艾伦·泰克泰尔时，他表示，吉尔之所以能够如此尽其所能为顾客服务，是因为联邦快递这样的公司鼓励员工去做这样的事情。关怀型的领导方式意味着支持和认可像吉尔这样的员工所付出的努力，从而使员工和客户都能从中获益。

    行动纲领

    若公司领导者希望通过关怀型领导方式获得优秀业绩，则必须做到以下三点：

    1. 绝不以员工的畏惧为领导手段。专注于员工不应该做的事情会增加他们在工作中的局促不安感，并增加其做出不道德行为的几率。

    2. 强调积极结果。遵循肯·布兰查德的原则，要寻找团队成员的优点，而不是把注意力集中在他们做错了什么上。诚然，任何一家公司总有需要惩戒的时候；但同样地，在更多情况下，如果你的员工表现优异，就应该得到认可。普华永道的报告也得出类似结论。

    3. 赋予团队权力。在联邦快递，吉尔拥有可以如此解决问题的自主权。如今，她已成为那位加拿大客户心中的英雄。通过给予员工广阔的活动空间，并发现员工的重要成就，弗里德·史密斯不仅在员工中深得人心，也得到客户的信赖。

    在此无意冒犯“教父”大人，但我认为，杰出的领导者，会将其领导风格的基石建立在关怀，而非畏惧的基础上。（财富中文网）

    A FedEx success story

    FedEx managers and employees live by what the company calls the Purple Promise: “Placing customers at the center of all we do.” I asked Fred Smith, the company’s CEO, to talk about how an employee faced a challenge at work but still honored the company’s mission. He told me about a woman I’ll call Jill who learned that a package containing two baby walkers intended for a Canadian customer never reached its destination. It had been damaged severely en route, and replacements were not for sale in Canada.

    Even though Jill had not been involved in the initial transaction with the customer, she “took personal responsibility, located and purchased the two baby walkers locally, prepared the paperwork, arranged for shipment to the customer and monitored the shipment until it was delivered,” Fred said. As a representative of the company as a whole, Jill felt it was her personal responsibility to get the customer the items she was expecting. “The customer was elated at the length FedEx went to take care of her,” Fred concluded.

    If you were that customer, wouldn’t you tell your friends and colleagues about how well the company treated you? The next time you need to send a package somewhere, which service would you use and recommend to others?

    When I told this story to Alan Tecktiel, Global HR Director at the law firm Baker & McKenzie, he noted that Jill was able to go to the lengths she did because companies like FedEx their employees to do these kinds of things. Caring leadership, which means supporting and recognizing the efforts of people like Jill, benefits employees and clients alike.

    Call to action

    Corporate leaders who want to deliver strong results through caring leadership should do these three things:

    1. Refuse to lead by fear. Focusing on what employees shouldn’t be doing increases the odds that they’ll be ill at ease at work and engage in unethical behavior.

    2. Accentuate the positive. Follow Ken Blanchard’s rule of looking for the good in your team members rather than zeroing in on what they’re doing wrong. Yes, there’s a place for discipline in every organization, but there is also plenty of room for acknowledging what your people are doing right. The PwC report came to a similar conclusion.

    3. Empower your team. At FedEx, Jill had the latitude to solve a problem the way she did and is now a hero to her Canadian customer. By granting his employees a wide berth and noting their considerable accomplishments, Fred Smith wins the hearts and minds of both the people who work for him and the people he works for.

    With all due respect to Don Corleone, outstanding leaders make care, not fear, the foundation of their leadership style.