How has Leslie been involved in supporting PwC’s organizational goals, successes, or growth?
[perfectpullquote align=”left” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”h2″ font-size=”h2″]She helped us with developing some of our strategy and vision from a firm-wide perspective and executing that at an accelerated rate.[/perfectpullquote]
Leslie was with us for seven or eight years and she helped us with a number of change management projects that we wanted to achieve as we looked to the future. For some larger projects, she was involved with me on a couple of board offsites, some sessions I’ve had with my leadership team, and in the big picture, she helped us with developing some of our strategy and vision from a firm-wide perspective and executing that at an accelerated rate.
What were your biggest learnings from working with Leslie?
I would start with a really basic one: the importance of change management and broader stakeholder management and spending the time and effort surrounding those initiatives, so we could actually make significant progress on the things that we wanted to get done. One of Leslie’s strengths with respect to that was on probing us around whether we had done enough, or if we had thought enough about certain things in order to make the progress we were looking at making. Initially, I may have been more of a neophyte with respect to recognizing the importance of change management, project management, etc. So that was an invaluable thing to learn.
The other thing that was really great with regards to our strategy and vision was in the way that Leslie helped us think about all of the interconnections or integration points so that we don’t have a program here and a program there, and a program somewhere else. Programs tend to be flavours of the day, and Leslie would do a much better job of teaching us the importance around communication and how everything fits together in an integrated way. She would ask: What are the few goals that we have? How are the things that we are doing meeting those goals? People start to connect differently if you start to connect the dots for them.
How is Leslie different than other consultants you have worked with?
[perfectpullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”h2″ font-size=”h2″]She would plant a seed in me in advance, so that I was already thinking about it rather than coming into a meeting and wanting to change the world overnight.[/perfectpullquote]
If she wanted me to do something that was really crazy and wild, she would plant a seed in me in advance, so that I was already thinking about it rather than coming into a meeting and wanting to change the world overnight. She was good at understanding her stakeholders and buyers and asking, how do I get people to the right spot to get to the best result for the firm?
The other thing that she was very good at—and this is why I used her as an outside consultant—was that she would push back and provide a different perspective. Even though she clearly knew that ultimately it would be my decision in the end for certain things, that didn’t stop her from providing a different point of a view, or a different lens. What I found valuable was that she could give me unfiltered feedback because she didn’t work in the organization, per se, and she also had different experiences that we may not have been exposed to already. That different perspective could then challenge our thinking.
What do you believe are Leslie’s biggest strengths or skill sets?
I think that Leslie is good at providing insights in a healthy, non confrontational way—yet if you weren’t listening, she would be happy to tell you that you weren’t listening, or that you hadn’t understood the concept. Sometimes you can be sitting in my position, and people don’t want to push back. What I liked about Leslie was that she actually liked to push back and she would ask us to rethink the issue, and follow up with three more questions in order to see whether there might be a different way to look at things. She wasn’t totally accepting of first response.
What has been the resulting impact on your organization, its leaders, and people?
The impact has been really positive overall. I don’t think she would have worked with us for seven years if it wasn’t. She’s done well, and she’s helped develop other people in our organization. There has been a number of projects that she has been involved with that were very positive and entailed things we needed to do for our long term sustainability, and she’s provided great counselling and advice with respect to that.
If a CEO colleague asked you if they should work with Leslie, what would you say?
[perfectpullquote align=”left” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”h2″ font-size=”h2″]I like to work with people who care, who are trying to help you become more successful, and whose heart and mind are in the right spot and Leslie is all of these things—she’s there because she’s trying to help. She does what she does for the right reasons.[/perfectpullquote]
I would be more than happy to recommend Leslie. I think that there are certain things that she is very good at and she has very bright ideas. The other thing that is important from my perspective as a CEO, is that she takes full ownership of the project. And when I say that, I mean she cares about the organization she is working for; I am a big believer that that is important. I like to work with people who care, who are trying to help you become more successful, and whose heart and mind are in the right spot and Leslie is all of these things—she’s there because she’s trying to help. She does what she does for the right reasons.
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