Nathan Holt, head of continuous improvement, Americas for Shell.
According to Nathan Holt, head of continuous improvement, Americas for Shell, in order for an organization to achieve a successful culture of operational excellence that results in long-term prosperity, three integral factors must be mastered. One is strategy development; another is problem solving. The third factor, leadership, makes implementing the first two factors much easier, Holt said.
"Leadership excellence is like the third leg in a three-legged stool," he added. "The other two legs can't stand on their own."
Holt said studies show leaders have three times the influence in changing organizational culture than other employees. In order to change people's behaviors, leaders must demonstrate strong, visible commitment.
"Don't assume human resources is doing it," Holt said at the Operational Excellence in Oil and Gas Summit held recently in Houston.
That strong, visible commitment requires leaders to "lead from the front," where they serve as role models, "versus cheerleading from behind," Holt continued. "Leaders must be as committed to cultivating these new behaviors as they are to the results."
Holt observed organizations cannot "PowerPoint their way" to a new culture.
"People learn through direct experience," he said. "And a leader's commitment is demonstrated through his or her actions."
Effective leaders, Holt said, do not exhibit the need for control or self-focus.
"They must go in with the soul of a servant and with respect for others in order to support the development of others and bring out the best in them," he said. "The mindset is, 'I'm not here to tell you what to do. I'm here to help you achieve what you know you need to do.'"
The recipe for success, Holt emphasized, is a "deep, time-consuming and expensive investment in developing everyone in the organization and believing your employees are your most precious resource."
Showing deep respect for everyone in the organization "energizes people," he said. "And then they give more than their hands; they give their hearts and their minds also."
Higher-level business performance requires more leadership excellence and less management, Holt explained, adding the ideal model is distributed leadership, "where you bring the highest level of commitment and capability out of everyone."
Leading with humility must precede any improvement, Holt said.
"It means that I'm willing to change myself to learn and be willing to say, 'We need improvement.'"
Leaders must reconsider actions they take on a daily basis as leaders, Holt said.
"Think less about putting out as many fires as you can and maybe a little bit more about how and why the fire started to begin with, experimenting your way to the solution," he suggested. "And look at your engagements with your people who work for you. When you talk to your people, observe if you ask questions when you speak. Or do you dictate?"
Finally, Holt recommended leaders ask themselves daily how much leadership they distribute and how much they hold onto, as well as whether they make their people feel as important as their leaders.
"The future is upon us. Evolving operational excellence to adopt certain activities and behaviors serves as the fuel to power our organizations for confronting the future," Holt concluded. "In doing so, we enable our organizations to focus on customers and employees as much as shareholders and to consistently generate higher returns so that we can invest and grow beyond the price, discovery and complexity challenges we are facing."
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