Virtual Interview

There are some ideas that become a core part of your identity early on. One of those ideas in my career was the idea of servant leadership. When I began learning management in my first supervisory position, I was taught servant leadership. I thrive as a leader when I have a team that I can support and develop.  I work to develop my team members both as experts and leaders themselves and then empower them to make the best decisions.

As I have studied leadership theory, I have actively worked to incorporate authentic leadership into my personal style. I work to reflect on my own personal attributes as a leader and remain honest and genuine about my own strengths, weaknesses, and tendencies. As a part of being an authentic leader, I understand and accept that I operate best as a servant leader and that it will always be a part of my personal leadership style.  

This is an interesting question because I don’t believe that I can answer this with a single defining achievement or moment. I believe that different aspects of my life have left me with different achievements that have all been great. Here are a few of those:

Professional Achievement

I have many memories of moments in my career that have made me proud. One that sticks out is actually a moment that has happened multiple times, and makes me proud every time. The first instance I remember of this is when I was transferring from a supervisor of one department at Best Buy to another. I announced the upcoming transfer to my team. Later I found out that one of my employees had approached my boss to express her concern. She told him that, in her entire work life, I had been the first supervisor she had ever had that had taken an interest in her personal growth and development. She was concerned that whoever replace me would not have that same dedication to the development and personal growth of the team. This type of conversation has happened as I have left other positions in my career as well. I have had employees who worked for me tell me that they have greatly appreciated their time on my team, my empathy for them as diverse individuals, and my dedication to their growth. As a leader, this feedback from my own team is one of the highest compliments that I can imagine ever receiving.

Educational Achievement

This answer is a little more of an expected answer, but not necessarily for the reason’s one might expect. My greatest educational achievement is definitely successfully defending my dissertation and completing my doctorate. The reason that this was my greatest achievement is not because it was a great undertaking of my own, but because it is a testament to my family.

Like any who have achieved this type of terminal degree, I spent years studying and working towards this goal. It was not only a personal sacrifice on my part, but a sacrifice that my family made for years. In fact, my dissertation was inspired by one of my daughters. The best moment of this process was when I was able to have my daughter stand with me after I was told that my dissertation was accepted with no changes. I was able to introduce her as the inspiration for my study and she got to see one of the biggest moments of my educational life. It was only right that her and the rest of my family were a part of that moment as they were the people who made it possible for me.

I would say that my greatest strength is the way that I approach a problem or project. I put a great deal of stock in systems thinking and critical thinking. I always work to approach any situation by ensuring that I have all of the available facts, that I work to analyze the facts to understand the full scope of the situation, and that I understand the effects of my decision – including the effects to other processes and individuals. This approach allows me to evaluate every situation and determine the best possible solution for all stakeholders. I believe that my approach is also why I have thrived in the areas of operations, improvement, and strategy.

As a leader striving towards an authentic style of leadership, I have done a lot of introspection about this topic. What I found is that, throughout my career, the aspect of my personality that has held me back more often than any other is that I am an introvert. I am not the person who is going to be speaking constantly throughout a meeting. I don’t always seek out opportunities for social interaction. 

While I am not the most outgoing person, I am aware of my own personality. While I will likely never dominate a conversation in a meeting, I do listen very well. I have spent years working to ensure that I know when it is important for me to speak up and be heard. I look for opportunities to build my network and attend events. Most importantly, I work to go out of my comfort zone and build great relationships with others in my organization. In a social situation I may be more reserved, but as I build these relationships, I have found that my conversations, meetings, and even events are more comfortable and productive. 

I have spent years working in environments that were full of stress, either because of the nature of my position or because of organizational stress that affected the employees. During these times, I have been able to thrive. I believe that one reason I thrive in these situations is that I am a very analytical and organized individual. What many people feel as stress with multiple projects and deadlines, I find to be an opportunity to organize and plan for success.  I’ve said man times that panicking has never helped anyone. Even under intense pressure, I prefer to approach every situation with a calm mind that can understand what needs to be done and create a plan that will get everything done in the most efficient way possible while ensuring the best quality of work. 

Another reason I believe that I thrive in these situations is that I find the stress of change exciting. I worked for a company that went through a lot of changes within a handful of years. We went through a spin-off from our parent company, a merger with another company, a buyout from one company, an announcement that we were closing, and then another buyout right before we closed. During one of these periods, I was speaking with the president of our company about all of the changes taking place. She was asking how things were going for me as I was not only a part of the company changes, but was also responsible for leading the changes in our operations at the time as well. I explained to her that I was doing great. I embraced the changes and, instead of letting them cause me stress and concern, I let my excitement build. It’s what drove me to my fondness for operations improvement and change management and it is how I find myself working through fast-paced stressful situations without the negative effects of that stress.

Years ago, I was a new store manager for Blockbuster. My first store was a small rural store that was failing. I took that location over and was told that I would likely end up having to replace most of the staff to get the store up to par. Three months later I had the store among the top performers in our district and I hadn’t let go of a single employee.

My boss came to me and asked me if I would like to take over another poor performing store closer to home. He even offered me a raise. This store had the reputation of being the “store manager killer.” No store manager had been able to turn this location around. They all either stepped down, transferred, or left the company. In my young arrogance as a new manager who had already had recent success, I thought there was no way that I would fail…I was wrong.

I worked at that store for a few months, employing everything I had in my repertoire to get that store to run as well as my previous location. I worked 80 hour weeks. I replaced staff. I trained and re-trained everyone in best practices. I still failed. By the time I realized that I was failing, I was experiencing burnout. The store manager killer gained another victim and I left the company. 

It was two years of working for a printing company and then a Realtor before I decided to get back in to a supervisory role.  I took the lessons I learned from my failure with me. I adapted and learned new ways of leading that would help me avoid issues with burnout. I worked to perfect the craft of operations. Eventually I even went back to school and studied business. In the end, it has all served me well. 

What I believe differentiates me from other candidates is that I have developed a unique diverse set of education and experiences that are transferable between industries and positions. I have worked across different industries in roles that have ranged from sales to operations and analytics. I have worked closely with individuals in marketing, finance, and accounting. I have education that has given me the business acumen to successfully lead teams at all types of organizations from start-ups to large corporations. 

All of these experiences, education, and skills will be utilized in any role. I can bring my diverse perspective and ability to think strategically to any situation. I don’t have the mindset that “this is the way its always been done.” This allows me to be creative and think outside of the box for solutions. Because I’ve worked across so many functional units, I can do all of this with a systems thinking mentality that allows me to identify many of the potential impacts that my decisions will have. 

Industries, operations, and processes can be learned. What I bring to the team is the critical thinking and systems approach that can only be honed through years of experience and education that spans multiple industries and roles.