Still Leading Like It's 1995? Your Outdated Leadership Is Slowing Down the Auto Industry

[Transcript]

[: 00:00:00

Stay true to yourself, be you, and lead with Gravitas, the hallmark of authentic leadership. Let's dive in.

This episode is brought to you by Lockton. Rising benefit costs aren't inevitable for you or your employees when you break through the status quo. Independence matters, it means Lockton can bring you creative, tailored solutions that truly serve your business and your people. At Lockton, clients, associates, and communities come first, not margins and not mediocrity. Meet the moment with Lockton.

leading automotive like it's: 1995

When is the last time that you asked yourself this question? Who are you, and how are you as a leader? Let that sink in for a moment. You know that I start every podcast interview with that question, because I think that we don't spend enough time looking at who we are as leaders and how we impact the culture of the automotive industry.

Because let's face it, if we don't transform the culture of this auto industry right now, then we are not going to make it into the future. You've heard me say many times, you can't run a 4K video on a '95 Windows operating system now, can you? So what makes you think that you can transform all the technology that's needed to transform the product in our beloved auto industry, if we don't look at the way that we do things, the way that we do business? The culture. The culture is the glue that holds it all together.

You can have the best technology on the planet. You can have the best possible vehicle design, but if you don't have the right people who are fully empowered to make decisions quickly. People who are agile in the way that they work with each other, who are collaborative and supportive of each other. Now, I'm not talking about a culture that's all nicey nice and all sweetness and light. This is the automotive business. I am painfully aware of that.

I am not talking about a soft culture. What I'm talking about is changing from command and control from that hierarchical structure that we've known for so long in this industry that slows us down. When we are making decisions following a hierarchy, when we are making decisions in silos, and we're not crossing functions or crossing those silos, it slows everything down. And we are never gonna transform this industry yet.

We are still using those same processes and those same systems that we have used for decades. If you listen to my episode with Terry Woychowski from Caresoft, he's the President of Caresoft. Terry was a Chief Engineer at General Motors, he understands how the design process works in a legacy auto company. He also understands how the Chinese OEMs work.

Now, granted, I know what you're thinking, "Oh, but they started with a clean sheet of paper." "Oh, and they get government funding." Yes, all of these things are true. But they are producing a product that is highly competitive, and whenever you go outside of the US you will see Chinese OEM product everywhere. So what are we going to do as an automotive industry to challenge our leadership, our culture, and the way that we do business so that we can be competitive? It starts with you.

I'm speaking to you, the listener of the Automotive Leaders podcast. I want you to take some time and answer that question: who are you and how are you as a leader? And don't come up with some answer that you think that you're supposed to say. Don't say something like, "Well, you're driven to get results to the bottom line and achieve budget." And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. No. Yes, of course you're there to deliver results. I get that. But how? So, it's who are you as a leader and how are you as a leader.

Now, if you want a little help. I am gonna put a link in the show notes to our 21 Traits of Authentic Leadership. Use that as a guide. Just very quickly skim through it and evaluate who you are as a leader in each one of those categories then talk to people on your team. Talk to people who are your peers that work alongside you, people who work for you, and maybe even the person you work for, and ask them the question: who are you? Who do they think you are as a leader? Is it time for you to change your leadership style? Is it time for you to take a long, hard look at how you're leading, particularly now in this time of uncertainty.

Every day you'll see something about, oh, but this period of uncertainty, whether it was COVID, whether it was the chip shortage, whether it's the tariff situation, whatever situation that we're in, we know that it's uncertain. We know that. We know that change is constant now in our industry. It just is. We have to accept that. But the question is, should your leadership style change and adapt to the environment that we're in? And here's something that I think leaders are grappling with — well, I don't think, I know. I've talked to some leaders who are grappling with this.

When we're in this period of uncertainty, we automatically go lean into more of a command and control type of leadership style, because it makes us feel safe. When we control something and we tell people what to do because we're in a tariff situation, we're in a supply chain emergency situation, then we tend to lean into more of a command and control model. So this period of uncertainty tends to want to push us more into command and control. Are you allowing that to happen? Or are you truly empowering your people? Because if you don't empower your people to make decisions with your support, if you don't trust your people, then you will lose them, particularly the younger generation.

There's two sides of the spectrum here: there's the people who are close to retirement who are just biting their tongues and saying, "Okay, I'll just deal with it until I get outta here." There's a lot of people out there right now. And then the younger generation are saying, " We cannot believe that this is what the world of automotive is actually like. I am not trusted. I am not empowered to make decisions. I'm gonna go somewhere else."

This is at the perfect time to take a long, hard look at yourself. And if you want to have a conversation with me about it, please do so. Email me, Jan, JAN@gravitasdetroit.com, and let's talk about it. Because if we don't change this industry now, I mean, right now, you can forget all this technology transformation.

The article that I co-authored with Terry Onica from QAD. We talk a lot about technology, 'cause obviously QAD is a technology forward company. And we went back into our history, and we talked about the times that we've been involved in ERP implementations. Whenever you're bringing in a new technology into a business, you know what happens. Typically, they cut the training module down to a bare minimum because they wanna cut cost, so that's a problem. People don't know how to use it. The leaders very rarely have done a good job of explaining the reason for the technology, the reason for the change, what it's going to do, how people are going to use it.

They didn't bring people along with the story. They just said, "Hey, we are moving to XYZ ERP company, and that's the way it's gonna be." And then what happens? People say, "Well, we don't know how to use it. We don't trust the data." And then it fails, and then people blame the technology company and off you go.

And then what? You see people going off with spreadsheets and side systems and the whole thing breaks down and you never actually get the full value and the ROI of that project that you were initially expecting. We see that so often. That type of leadership will not cut it. We all need technology, more technology, AI adoption. Don't be afraid of AI. Figure out how to bring it into your organization, into your function, but you've gotta bring people along with you.

Great leaders for the future have the ability to cast out a vision that's strong, that's meaningful, that people can connect with. A vision that they can get behind, and they keep that in front of people. The leaders of the future keep their gaze up.

In my conversation with Stephen Covey, I used the term 'they raise their gaze.' And leaders today, how often, again, in automotive, how often are we down in the weeds? Because that's a bit of a badge of honor.

This episode is sponsored by UHY. UHY, and the Center for Automotive Research are digging into how suppliers quote and win with OEMs. The results drop at CAR MBS, September the 15th through the 17th at Michigan Central. Stay tuned.

Why do we feel that to be a successful leader today we gotta be down in the weeds all the time? I've seen that play out multiple times in my career, where people feel that they're tough and they know everything about everything. And when there's a call with 15 people and there's a crisis, some VP will jump on the call and then what happens? It ends up being two VPs having a conversation or getting into it, and everybody else is on the call, just listening along. And what have you done? You just cut the legs off your entire team.

So I'm not saying VPs don't need to get involved in crisis situations. Of course they do. But be careful how you get involved. Make sure that your team is empowered to make the decisions and that you are supporting them all the way. That's the kind of leadership that we need for the future.

No longer are you in there micromanaging the hell out of everything and down in the weeds with those details. It's difficult to know when to drill down in the details and when to pull back. I know. I know it is. But I would ask you to question what is your natural tendency and can you alter that? Can you ratchet that back a little bit to empower the team? It's a question worth asking and definitely worth finding out the answer to.

When you've done that as a leader and you got some answers to that question, you know who you are and how you show up as a leader. I would challenge you to put out your leadership statement, and you're probably thinking, "Well, what? What is that?" Don't jump on ChatGPT and ask it to give you a leadership statement. Do it from the heart.

Think about your values. Think about people who you've admired in the past, their behaviors. Then start to think about the future. Where do you wanna be 10, 20 years from now? Ask yourself some of these big, lofty questions.

Find out your values. What are your top five values? Weave all this together. Tell some stories around each aspect of this. Maybe there's a story that you remember being on a retreat with a team and there was some sort of team workshop, and it was such a great experience and it comes to mind and you wanna talk about it. Think about that. Then record yourself. You know, there's so much technology out there. You can even do it on Zoom, whatever technology you wanna use. But record it, just talk through it. You're not gonna send that recording anyway. It's just for you. Then look at the transcript and look at how many times certain words show up.

I've worked with leaders where we've gone through this in a very, very, in-depth process. And I will notice things like, maybe the word trust will come up, and they'll say that, "Well, I really like this leader that I work for because they trusted me and I felt empowered and I felt like I could do anything and they were there. They had my back." And then you look further down, and in the transcript, the word trust just keeps coming up. So that's important to them. It's an important value. It's something that really resonates with them.

So, look at that transcript and then put it all together and think about what is your commitment to your team as a leader. So often, as leaders, we want people to commit to us. We say, "Well, I'm the leader. I'm the VP in charge of this organization or this function. You need to tell me what you're gonna do for me." Uh-uh. Nope. Flip the script. What are you gonna do for them? What is your commitment to leadership for your team? That's something we don't think about very often. Articulate that. Put that into the recording and put it all together and come up with a leadership statement. It's a couple of sentences that describe who you are, what you want from your team, but what you are going to do to commit as a leader to your team.

was simple. He said: I am in: 1000

But I would ask you to think about that. What are you going to commit to your team? Are you going to commit to support them when they fail? Are you gonna commit to creating a safe environment to allow them to grow and to thrive. What are you gonna do? Are you gonna treat them fairly? Are you going to respect them? Are you going to be understanding when they have personal issues in their lives? What are you gonna commit to as a leader? Ask yourself that question and answer it. Then put all of this together into a leadership statement 2, 3, 4 sentences max. Nothing more than that. Don't write it in corporate speak, please. Write it in normal human language, and then look at the words that you've used and the commitments and the statements that you've made, and make sure that there's a story behind them. Because the reason they're on there is because they were important to you because of something that happened in your life.

Your life story is your leadership story, as Doug Conant would say, and I believe that it's true. Don't think that you've got to shy away from your life story from your personal life. It's part of who you are. We're not two separate people at work and at home. I used to think that you had to be that way, but you are not. You are one person, you're one human, and the more that you can bring your humanity, your authenticity, who you are to work, the more successful you will be as a leader. Your team will respond to that authenticity, and you will be well on your way to creating a high performance team.

And again, I wanna stress, I am not talking about being all sweetness and light, far from it, but I am talking about being real, being authentic, putting realistic goals out there, telling stories to help explain your vision and what you want and what you need, and building positive accountability so that people can perform in a safe environment where trust reigns supreme. That's what the leaders of the future are all about.

I wanna go back for a moment to technology — bringing technology into the workplace — whether it's an ERP system, whether it's AI, whatever technology it is. If you look at the, really, really look at the reasons why these implementations fail or they don't give you the results that you've expected, it's because of leadership or lack of leadership and culture. It's not because of the technology.

And I interviewed a guy by the name of Jesse Jacoby, and he's a change management guru. And he recited a stat — which I believe is out there, you can research it — that 70% of change initiatives fail. 70%. And that's because, primarily, the leaders don't do a good enough job of telling the story and the reason why we need the change or we need the new technology. They don't bring the people along and they skim out on the training behind it.

So this culture, sometimes people roll their eyes when I tell 'em, "Hey, I'm the architect of culture change in the automotive industry," And they just roll their eyes, like, what the heck is that? Right?

It is the glue that holds everything together. It is the core of leadership. Leaders define the culture, who you are, how you behave, how you operate defines the culture of your company, or your function, or your department.

ould be. Don't lead like it's: 1995

We have an industry to transform. We have no time left. The tariff situation has bought us a little bit of time, maybe. But you know the Chinese OEMs are out there eating our lunch. When those vehicles come into the US then ah, we're done. We're done. I don't know any other way to put it to you. To describe it.

So please take a long, hard look at leadership and culture. I'll put a link to the 21 Traits of Authentic Leadership in the show notes. I'll link the article that I wrote with Terry. And if you wanna have further conversation about this, I am here. I am here to support you. I am on a mission to transform this industry. And we can do it. We can do it together.

And with that, I will say, believe in yourself, be your 100% beautiful, authentic self, and lead with Gravitas, the hallmark of authentic leadership.

Thank you for listening to the Automotive Leaders Podcast. Click the listen link in the show notes to subscribe for free on your platform of choice. And don't forget to download the 21 Traits of Authentic Leadership PDF by clicking on the link below. And remember, stay true to yourself, be you, and lead with Gravitas, the hallmark of authentic leadership.