Keep everyone connected
Even if you have everyone in your company motivated and willing to work, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re working together.
Preventing silos within your company takes constant and consistent communication, not just from you but from leaders
throughout the organization.
Bento says the best way to bring different divisions and departments together is in meetings. Even if gathering your managers
into the same room on a frequent basis isn’t practical for your
company, there are still benefits to doing it as often as possible.
At CEVA, Bento’s entire senior staff meets monthly, while the
executive team meets each Monday.
“Because there is so much interdependency in our business, we
have to keep together on things,” he says. “We meet as an executive team every single Monday just to keep a pulse on the overall
business, where are the hot spots and whether we need to rede-ploy resources to solve a particular issue.
“Our monthly senior staff meetings enable the staff functions
within freight management to be tuned in to what is going on
with the overall business as well as their functions in supporting
what needs to get done.”
Bento says your ability to engage your people in person is a critical element to keeping everyone connected and working toward
the same organizational goals.
“Everything we say (as leaders) has meaning,” he says. “If you
can’t be trustworthy in your position, you’re doomed. In an interdependent business like ours, communication is foundational.
You have to be able to deliver on your promises.”
With that in mind, Bento says communication and getting out
among his people takes precedence over most of his other
administrative responsibilities, and it shows on his appointment
calendar.
“Just to give you a flavor for it, in the last two months, I’ve been
to appointments in Zurich, Glasgow, Dublin, Birmingham,
London, Tokyo, Bangkok, New York, Chicago and Los Angeles.
So what I try to do is prioritize that as best I can. In terms of
administrative functions, I try to do those after I’ve had a chance
to go out into the work force.”
HOW TO REACH: CEVA Logistics, www.cevalogistics.com
