When former Engineers Australia National President David Cruickshanks-Boyd HonFIEAust was young, he avoided conflict. Little did he know that this character trait could lead to a mistake that would endanger a $400 million project.
As told to Joe Ennis.This article was originally published in the August 2024 issue of create.
It was the early 1980s. I was working as a project manager at a large engineering firm. I was running several large projects, including a $400 million mineral sands project for a key client.
Like most people, I don’t like conflict. When something is going wrong, my tendency is to try to either avoid it or not confront it head-on. With this project we were working as the client’s partner in delivering a mining project that was, at the time, our biggest project ever.
I was the principal in charge of our team and we had a real issue around availability of people. One of our key personnel was being torn between two clients and I allowed that to go on for too long – until it became evident to our major client that he wasn’t doing what he was supposed to be doing.
But I let it go on because, as a stereotypical engineer, I avoided the people side of the job. I didn’t have the courage to have an honest conversation with a client about the challenge, and the problem of the people that were being supplied to the project.
Of course, the client realised the issue wasn’t being addressed and raised the issue with me – which meant the difficult conversation had to happen. There was no avoiding it anymore.
I really had to summon my courage to address this. I apologised and openly admitted my failings as the leader of the team, and discussed how to address the issue. The client accepted this and over a period of time we were able to rebuild the trust that was lost. The relationship grew stronger and eventually we delivered the project ahead of time and under budget, earning the company a bonus in the process.
If I’d had the courage to be honest earlier and address the personnel issue, it wouldn’t have reached a relationship-damaging level. When I eventually had this conversation and revealed my authentic self, acknowledged mistakes and took responsibility for rectifying them, the response was life-changing. I became aware of my own behaviours and though it is difficult to change innate personality traits, being aware of them allows me to make better decisions and become a better leader.
Courage and authenticity are the qualities that I believe enable engineers to be great leaders.
Three key lessons
- Take every opportunity to learn about yourself and act on your insights.
- Criticism is a good tool; don’t reject it, reflect on it.
- Don’t avoid tough decisions. They will need to be made eventually.
David Cruickshanks-Boyd HonFIEAust recently retired after a long career in materials and biomaterials engineering. He continues to serve the profession as a board member of the Engineers Australia College of Leadership and Management.
Very wise counsel 1,2,3. Thank you. A word maybe out of HR current fashion that could help here is ‘Empathy’. We all learn it by relationship experiences. HR AI may eventually be taught it, but a human manager can adaptively still exercise empathy for human staff and human client/corporate client representative to help manage the interactive working balance between delegations for staff development and resourcing the task delivery with responsibility for both client’s goodwill in result, without burnout of either or both or all. Humility for self-reflection is a mark of a good interactive leader.