Two junior colleagues took over as executive managers of music4friends for two months. The agency had been awarded the NEW WORK AWARD 2018 by Xing for this experiment titled “Trainees being Boss”. We spoke to Darlene Hammer (22) about her experiences:
01 Complete the sentence: For me the experiment “Trainees being Boss” was …
… a unique and very special experience I’m really grateful for!
02 What was your focus, why was it of importance to you and how did you prepare?:
My focus was everything to do with growth. With all the liasing we do with with our clients and fantastic musicians, I was passionate about the personal growth of each and every team member at the office. Each of us should be granted the opportunity to advance their knowledge according to their individual strength and interests and to gather new experiences that might be valuable to the whole team. Other than that, we tested different methods that all aimed at empowering us as a team, making use of our differences and working even more efficiently.
03 What was your biggest challenge?:
I find it difficult to put the biggest challenge into words: I experienced quite intensely how important it is to be active in your role as a leader. To reach the goals I had set for the time being boss, I had to make sure to have the other team members be engaged in these goals and projects as well. My task was thus to find an adequat balance in asking for regular updates but at the same time taking pressure off and supporting them whenever need be.
It was fascinating to see the difference in people working on a project their care about or if they are simply fulfilling a task they were given.
04 What was your biggest success?:
It meant a lot to me that the team took up my idea of personal growth with so much enthusiasm. They all willingly presented courses they wanted to do to develope their skills and that made me super proud!
05 How did these two months of being boss change you as a person?:
I definitely won’t forget these two months for a while. For one, I’m very grateful that our bosses put so much trust in Marnie and I and allowed us to go through with the swap of roles. Also knowing that the team has our backs and were open to the whole experience meant a lot from the start.
I think these two months intensified our office relationships in terms of getting to know each other even better, seeing our individual strengths clearly and identifying with our role at music4friends. We came up with so many great ideas that I’m really looking forward to all those projects that started to sprout during this time.
-> Connect with Darlene on XING!
-> Read part I: Interview 1/2 MARNIE GÜNTHER on “Trainees being Boss”
