CHALLENGES OF A TEAM LEADER

As I indicated in my last blog post on 11 July 2013, I am currently deployed as military observer in a UN peacekeeping mission in Democratic Republic of Congo in East Africa. Military observers are a sub unit of a military component of UN peacekeeping force. Our duties as military observers are to observe and report information relevant to the implementation of the UN mandate in Democratic Republic of Congo. Military observers are professional military officers of the rank of a captain and above, deployed throughout the mission and not more than 6 officers from different countries. The location where they are deployed is often referred to as Team Site. Currently, we are 6 officers: 4 Majors,1 Lieutenant Colonel and I Captain from Ghana, India, Indonesia, Ukraine, Egypt and Bolivia. I am a Ghanaian Major and the team leader is from Bolivia.

The team leader went on leave for one month and I was appointed the team leader. The responsibilities of the team leader include operational, security and administrative effectiveness, timely and accurate reporting of all incidents, regular update of documents and maintenance of equipment and vehicles, and conduct and discipline among others. I saw this appointment as an opportunity to improve on my employability skills in the area of leadership skill specifically, persuasion skills, organizing skills, and listening skills and how to lead a team. Listening and communications skills were critical to me because of the language differences and the fact that I have a dream to work in a multinational environment after leaving the military. Leading professional officers from different cultures is a challenge and can be extremely difficult in a multinational peacekeeping environment. Again, the people I was supposed to lead knew that this appointment was temporal. On my first meeting one of them was 10 minute late and I saw this as my first test. To be firm and avoid offending him and the others members of the team I told him right away that officers are time conscious so to avoid any embarrassment  such behavior would not be tolerated. He later came to apologize and promised not to repeat such unprofessional conduct so my strategy worked.

Because we were of the same rank, they felt comfortable to air their views but  I made it clear even though we were  to work as a team , the final decision would be taken by  me .I gave then individual task, with specific performance indicators  and deadlines and added that I would be available for all clarification. In doing this, I improved on my coordination and supervisory skills. During this period I chaired various meetings involving other UN agencies, NGOs and local security agencies. In interpreters become valuable during such meetings because English and French are the key languages used in such meetings. Controlling people during such meeting was another big challenge. Here, my communication skills were put to test and I think I passed because of the comment that came to me later. I had to give directives but ensured it did not appear as a typical military orders with deadlines and the results were unimaginable. I had to ensure that all daily reports that were supposed to be sent to headquarters were sent on time and were correct.

Within this period our Team Site received VIP visitors whom I had to do presentations about the activities about our Team Site and in our area of responsibility. This was typical of a peacekeeping environment. In such environment, people are identified by their country so sometimes you are addressed by the name of your country.  Again, I saw such visits as opportunity to demonstrate by professional competency and the pride of being a Ghanaian. Transitioning from the military to the corporate world or civilian institutions is always difficult so I saw my team leader appointment as an opportunity to demonstrate my versatile capabilities and I also expected criticisms from the people I was supposed to lead. I think all these adds up to the employability skills required of today’s job seeker.