Leading teams in a pandemic

We are living through extraordinary times and effective leadership has never been more important. I recently had the exciting opportunity to speak with Jurgen Klopp, the manager of Liverpool FC about his leadership style, who led the club to become champions of the English Premier League after 30 long years. Klopp is considered one the best football club managers in the world and speaking to him made me reflect on what I think makes a leader more likely to succeed.

Resilience: The pandemic has shown us how we can be much more adaptable and agile than we think. Looking ahead, it is crucial that we design our organisations and teams to be able to succeed amidst challenging circumstances and rapidly changing times. We need to innovate, adapt, learn and un-learn at speed if we were to remain relevant in the lives of our clients. We must also learn to deal with failure – we all make mistakes, but the defeat becomes real if you don’t learn from them. Klopp gave the example of LFC’s 7-2 loss against Aston villa, which they overcame to eventually win the EPL.

Be genuine: Often people are afraid to be their true selves at work. Friendships with senior colleagues are inhibited by the culture of a seniority divide. To Klopp, being friends with his players wins both hearts and minds. For a good leader, being genuine at work doesn’t mean you relinquish your authority. Rather, it helps to break down barriers and build true relationships and camaraderie that help drive joint success. 

Building high quality teams: Hiring and nurturing the right talent is key to success. Equally crucial is creating an atmosphere where people can thrive. For me that means building a corporate culture where people are not afraid to challenge, learn and innovate. Klopp emphasised the importance of ‘listening’ and that resonates with me a lot – as leaders we must respect our people and hear their views – that’s how we will understand the strengths and weaknesses of our businesses and how to take them forward. 

Dig deeper:Recognising what works and what doesn’t is essential for future success. Thanks to technology, we have data goldmines that allow us to deep dive into our successes and failures. For Klopp data analysis had a big role in LFC’s decision to hire him as manager, through the analysis of his performance with previous clubs. For wealth managers, data needs to become front and centre of how we design products and services for our clients so that they are relevant to clients’ needs.

Putting clients at the centre:When you want to be successful, you need to create a power unit. For Klopp and LFC, this meant bringing the LFC players and supporters together. For me, as the Global Head of Wealth Management, it is about creating strong relationships between Standard Chartered and our clients. That means delivering the right solutions for them, so that we earn the status of trusted advisors along their financial journeys.