Chris revisits the key points made by Peter Wuffli, adds his own insights and gives listeners some suggestions for practical actions they can take immediately to help them get where they want to go.
Welcome to every one of our Perspectives from the Top community of listeners around the world to “Reflections from the Top”. “Reflections” is to help you get the best from the series by me reviewing the key points from our latest guest, giving you some of my insights and suggesting a few simple practical actions you can take to get the best out of what our guests said to help you get to where you want to be. You will get much more out of Reflections key points if you have listened to the guests interview and heard the broader discussion.
Our last guest Peter Wuffli started his career in McKinsey, before joining with Swiss Bank Corporation, which then merged with Union Bank of Switzerland to create UBS in 2002, soon after which he became CEO at just 44. The building of UBS is a Harvard Case study on successful integration & transformation. In 2006 Peter started his Elea Foundation, focused on alleviating poverty around the world through entrepreneurial impact He left UBS in 2007. He is on the board of Sygnum Bank the first digital asset bank in the world and was on the bord of Partners Group one of the largest private equity investors. Peter is also Honorary Chairman of IMD Business School and an author.
At this point I should let you know that I worked with Peter at UBS when he was CEO and I can absolutely confirm that’s all the insights and ideas the Peter spoke about in the interview are what he did on a day to day basis unlike some leaders who say one thing and then do another.
Peters first point based on his work at McKinsey was a reflection of what other guests have said, quite simply that where a collegiate and partnership environment exists rather than a hierarchical one things are more likely to go successfully. That also within this context everyone should be able to express their views and indeed have an obligation to say if they think there is an opportunity to do things better, “obligation to dissent” as Peter described it. Peter said that this power of partnership is driven by inclusive leadership which operates both vertically and horizontally in an organisation. But his view, and I agree, is that there are still too many senior leaders operating a hierarchical approach to leadership which don’t to optimise outcomes. You have probably experienced this as well, and the real difference on your and the teams performance where everyone, including your boss, are working in partnership rather that the boss just telling everyone what to do. But not only that, but how good you felt in that partnership environment.
Unusually for C suite leaders in most of the world Peter has had military training and experience. That's because within Switzerland there is a requirement for everyone to do some form of national service. This gives Peter the ability to identify where elements of military skills and leadership development can deliver benefits within a commercial context, as indeed I can having been on both sides of the fence. Particularly in the areas of resilience, an operating method to respond quickly and effectively to dynamic situations and the ability to manage a crisis. I would add to that the military has a very strong “we not me” culture – going to Peter collegiate point - culture that holds the teams and organisation together during a challenging time which many commercial organisations lack. Again we are back to the power of partnership. Peter spoke about the criticality of trust based relationships founded on clear values and purpose. It's worth me saying here that my neuroscience studies show that the success of this environment is almost guaranteed as it's powered by really deep sub conscious emotions and feelings in response to the positivity and trust shown in us by those around us.
He also mentioned the importance of leaders, no matter how senior, being seen to do what he described as “real work” ie demonstrate their capability in at least some area of what the organisation needs to get done.
But it's clear that Peters perspective on entrepreneurial activity is that it should not just be just confined to the startup environment but should happen even in large organisations. This was one of the critical Success Factors that we worked on at UBS through developing entrepreneurial leadership within the organisations senior levels to create “one UBS”.
But both from our experiences in UBS and from elsewhere the mindset of the entrepreneurial leader in seeking out opportunity and therefore taking risk is something that is often contrary to some of the corporate governance and risk thinking of large organisations. Peter made the point that many people in senior roles in major organisations have never operated within the context of an entrepreneurial environment. So he posed the question where is the entrepreneurship that the organisation needs to survive long term? But UBS and some of both Peters work and mine shows that leaders in larger organisations can be entrepreneurial within an operational framework if given permission by senior leaders. How many of you listening have been asked explicitly by your boss to speak out at any time if you see opportunity to do things better? Probably not that many. But if they did it probably boosted your motivation as well as getting new ideas.
This led on to Peters comments about his own work in private equity where this allows a more entrepreneurial approach to delivering organisational success than it might within a large listed organisation. And he suggested that this was also illustrated by the revival of the large family business sector within Europe, Asia and elsewhere.
Peters founding of his Elea foundation was a pioneering first step in the world of impact investing – that’s the concept of using ground level entrepreneurs to alleviate poverty rather via the traditional development project approach. His foundation invests over a period of seven to 10 years to take viable organisations from start up to early growth. The future of the foundation Peter suggested was utilising entrepreneurial activity to not only fight poverty but also to deal with climate change at the same time. He certainly proposed the principle that it should be possible to align liberal capitalism to be able to fight poverty and climate change at the same time.
From my perspective Peter poses some really interesting questions about whether the way we do business is now optimal for the challenges we face and whether we need to have a deeper partnership between government business and wider society within a framework liberal capitalism.
If you want to go into greater depth on the points that Peter raised then it will be well worth getting his book “Inclusive leadership” to look at the leadership perspective and the book he co authored on alleviating poverty through impact investing “the Elea Way – Learning Journey to sustainable impact”.
For you listening the points Peter made at the end of our discussion are powerful I don't think that I can think of points which you would be better to take and implement. What are they?
If we all listening today did just those four things as of tomorrow it would not only transform the our own lives and those around us but also make our organisations significantly more successful.
Try to implement Peters ideas and it would be great to hear your success stories. Maybe note down the key points from each Reflection, or use the scripts, because even with just Paul Epstein, Peter Mauer, Sylvia Acevedo, Andy Byford, Lisa Gable and now Peter hopefully you are seeing a pattern of consistent actions our guests have all taken to enable them to be successful. Certainly I will be using these powerful points in my speaking and Masterclasses in the future.
If you have any thoughts or questions contact me on LinkedIn or via email as detailed on the Perspectives website. And don't forget to sign up to Perspectives from the Top. It's free, so you don't miss any of the more than 25 great episodes in the future.
That’s it for now, so onwards and upwards until our next episode!