For a few years now, my leadership and team trainings´ main
emphasis has been on the production sector : Shift leaders and foremen, masters,
production assistants and production managers.
During the creation of looser hierarchies and the moving of
leadership responsibility "downwards", production leaders in my
experience have difficulties accepting the challenges connected to this. A
foreman or shift leader, for example, who only yesterday was a colleague and
"buddy", today has to fulfil classic leadership tasks: making goal
agreements, having discussions with employees, controlling the quality,
appreciating but also criticizing and at the same time, keeping his team´s
motivation high.
Of course, he does not want to seem "conceited" or
authoritarian in his colleagues´ eyes, but often he has to meet factory and
company interests in a more distinct and committed way than he used to in his
old role. For many people, this task creates conflicting feelings and insecure
behaviour. From my observation, many think they must now decide between turning,
buddy-like, a blind eye, and the "hard line". They don´t know any
in-between option, and exactly this is their dilemma.
To get out of this dilemma and show a new way to these
production leaders - how they can meet their company´s as well as their
employees´ interests, how they can be boss and colleague at the same time -
this is the task I have chosen for myself .
