Reflecting on what it means to lead

Marc Sinkewitz is not one to fear change. After graduating with a diploma in business administration in 2008, he joined the finance sector and boldly took on a wide variety of roles including but not limited to the areas of client servicing, innovation and real estate. 

By the time he reached a decade in the finance industry, he had risen to the rank of director at a bank with assets of over 5 billion Euros, and was raring to go for a new challenge. So near the end of 2022 when he was offered an opportunity to join local bank, Sparkasse Neuwied, as a board member, he leapt at the opportunity. The theme of embracing change, also stretches through his family; as aside from his embracing changes in his career, his wife and two children packed their bags and started the new year in a new city nearer to his job opportunity.

New role, new culture, new challenges

Despite Marc’s wealth of experience in finance and leadership, he found the new role came with challenges. Firstly, he found that he had to adapt and learn how to communicate and manage the shareholders and stakeholders, and area that he had different exposure to in the past. Secondly, in adapting to the culture of the company. The new organisation is smaller than his previous, and runs in a more traditional, top-down management style.

As an advocate for mental health, Marc hopes to transform the culture to be become a more collaborative one, one where psychological safety is at a forefront and his employees are bold enough to embrace continuous learning, improvement, and innovation. However, Marc also acknowledges that to achieve such cultural change is no mean feat. To succeed, he believes it is important for management to lead by example and model the behaviours they hope to see.

The makings of a good leader

He shares that he feels particularly strongly not having a single specific role model, an interesting take on this question. In Germany, he shares, you learn more from bad leaders. This cemented his belief about leaders needing to walk the talk instead of ruling by fear and conditional situations — he did not agree with such leadership styles and they were unable to command his respect.

Aiming to be a leader who strives to go beyond simply having charisma and exerting authority, Marc aims to build authentic and meaningful connections with the people he works with. He keeps the channel of communication open, and encourages employees to speak up, so managers have a clear understanding of their needs, and the best steps to take.

A core behaviour that he believes a good leader should always emphasise, is that when things go wrong, never start finger pointing and blaming the team. Instead, he shares that focusing on what the team can learn from the situation, and the steps to take for them to move on are far more useful in progressing. This, he explains, ensures a safe environment where employees are empowered to learn and grow.

Stepping out of the comfort zone and into INSEAD

Throughout Marc’s career he had been working with a career coach to chart his professional development. Approaching his new role at Sparkasse Neuwied was no different. Knowing there was more work to be done to smoothen his transition and to be an authentic leader he asked his coach to recommend some programmes to update his understanding and techniques of leadership. This is how he found out about The Leadership Transition at INSEAD.

Candidly, Marc shares that he initially hesitated because the programme is taught in English. Working at a local bank, his preferred language of communication is German, and rarely has to use English in his day-to-day management. Taking the programme would therefore mean he’d have to go from speaking minimal English, to conducting full conversations in the language each day, and with people from a wide variety of different countries. He was also uncertain how relevant the globally-focused curriculum would be to his daily work, as he worked primarily with local German institutions.

Ultimately, his career coach’s encouragement, along with his own curiosity and desire for self-improvement, motivated him to give it a try. Determined to make the best of his new opportunity, Marc hired an English coach to brush up on his fluency and in February 2023, flew to Fontainebleau for the first part of the programme.

Opening doors to new perspectives

Reflecting and learning new techniques is something that is commonly done with his career coach. However to Marc’s delight, he found stepping out of his comfort zone to INSEAD was “incredible”, with each day of the programme proving to be even more insightful and inspiring than the last.

One of the biggest highlights for him was to be able to interact with participants from different countries through a range of activities like case discussions, experiential exercises, role plays, group coaching and more. This brought him in touch with people from Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa and more, people he would never have met otherwise in his daily life. Hearing their different views on leadership helped broaden Marc’s perspectives. This enhanced his ability see situations from different angles and imbued him with new approaches to take at work.

In addition, he enjoyed being able to learn from Mark Mortensen, Associate Professor of Organisational Behaviour, who shared extensively about his work in mental health, and the growing importance of having skills such as resilience and perseverance.

Particularly beneficial was also that the programme takes on a modular format. Participants return to work in between the first and second module, so they have a chance to apply their new knowledge and work on their leadership challenges together with the coaches before coming back to campus with feedback and questions.

Lessons for the future

Reflecting on his time in The Leadership Transition, Marc recalls fond memories of the beautiful Fontainebleau campus. He shares how the soothing atmosphere was conducive for learning and affirms that the programme aligned well with his existing beliefs on leadership, offering him valuable takeaways for his daily work.

Today, he is more confident managing shareholders and has started actively networking. He also regularly applies the various frameworks taught in class to build a culture of collaboration and trust at his workplace. In fact, the INSEAD notebook has become a permanent fixture on his desk, so he can easily reference it for inspiration, or to refresh his memory of the insights gained.

Importantly, he shares that he has gained clarity about his past behaviours and motivations. He has increased his self-awareness and developed a process of self-reflection to guide him as he continuously improves as a leader.

For Marc, The Leadership Transition is just the beginning of his learning journey. Once his schedule frees up, Marc hopes to take up additional Executive Education programmes, considering the INSEAD’s Business Sustainability Programme and Strategic Management in Banking as next steps to help in his career growth. With these programmes completed, he will quality for the INSEAD Certificate in Global Management, a formal recognition of continuous professional development in the areas of global management and leadership, and to eventually become part of the INSEAD alumni network.

Marc’s advice for other potential candidates considering The Leadership Transition? “Don’t hesitate. Just do it — it’s a great experience, and once you start learning, you never stop.”