“This Woman Has Changed Business Forever” by Bo Burlinghyam: The Roddick Case

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Use of Personal Power and Influence
Willingness to Take Personal Risk
Follower Disenchantment
Communication of Self-Confidence
Use of Unconventional Strategies
Accurate Assessment of Situation
Extremity of Vision
Conclusion
Works Cited

Introduction

A leader with great charisma needs to be able to influence other people in his/ her belief of what is right since that is what leadership entails. A leader can achieve great charisma for better influence by learning the required seven leadership principles. The principles involve the ability to use individual power and influence; having belief and confidence in oneself, being able to analyze situations accurately to act well; being a very good communicator, making prudent use of strategies that may not necessarily be conventional, having enchantment on the people following after the leader, having great visions way beyond extreme and having a willingness to take risks to influence. The above-mentioned mechanisms play a crucial role in ensuring the success of a leader. In the article, Roddick displays exemplarily and great leadership abilities as well as great charisma through the application of the seven mechanisms in the management of the body shop.

Use of Personal Power and Influence

Just like other people engaged in business, Roddick as a woman had feared at the beginning which was mainly from languages of business, having to contend with negative behaviors of customers, for example, untidiness among other fears. The process of overcoming her fears was done using her power and influence. Since the store had a legend of existence in the United Kingdom with a period of thirteen years in operation, it had established itself as a popular brand. Through this mechanism, therefore, she is just required to use the body shop’s influence already existing on its customers to achieve higher heights in business (Burlinghyam, p. 3). The company’s products are experiencing self-advertising based on the company’s good name. In the case of Roddick, advertising would just be to fulfill formalities and achieve a competitive edge rather than just informing customers of the goodness of the products it offers.

Willingness to Take Personal Risk

The charisma of Roddick is shown through her readiness and willingness to take personal risks through ensuring the involvement of her shop in a good number of activities even if the financing of the same has to come from her savings (Burlinghyam, p. 9). This characteristic has severally raised criticisms from both customers and other ordinary people. In their criticism, they purport that her risk-taking actions are a way of business advertising and profit or sale increment. Although this can cause her to lose some of her customers, Roddick is not bothered since she desires to help people. Additionally, she acknowledges the fact that despite all the challenges facing her at the beginning, she took the bold step of taking the risk to set up the shop.

Follower Disenchantment

The high number of customers allows Roddick to use the follower disenchantment mechanism. This would require customer follow-up to retain them since they are very loyal and act as good agents of advertising for the great products at the shop. The display pattern of the products plays a great role in customer enticement. The customers who come to the shop can locate what they want without the necessity of having to inquire from the sales staff due to the orderly manner of the body shop and the clear labeling of the products (Burlinghyam, p. 4).

Communication of Self-Confidence

Roddick is largely known for her character of intense commitment to her work. This provides an opportunity for her to make use of the mechanism of communication of self-confidence. The fact that Princess Diana uses the body products from Roddick’s shop gives her the advantage to use her in advertisement campaigns. This increases her confidence since people would be drawn to use products usually used by Princess Diana. Not only does Roddick have confidence in the products she is offering to the market, but also a belief in them together with the good qualities they hold.

Use of Unconventional Strategies

Roddick also engages in the use of strategies that are not necessarily conventional. For instance, her media involvement in product advertisements helps to ensure that they are readily available to customers and other ordinary people. Roddick also plays the role of customer educator about the products’ importance which helps her to win their credibility towards her. Additionally, Roddick uses different ingredient types to increase the varieties of products to make customers get their favorite choice of the same (Burlinghyam, p. 5). The issue of having many product brands availed in the store acts as a marketing strategy to counter competition while customer education increases their confidence in the products of the shop. This is because they are sure of the good business practices and values of the company they are buying from. Roddick increases the hard work of her employees by providing them with incentives and offering them the necessary training. Additionally, Roddick ensures that the employees are kept informed about issues of maximizing profits as well as improving services to customers (Burlinghyam, p. 7).

Accurate Assessment of Situation

Roddick further uses the mechanism of assessing the situation to act accordingly (Burlinghyam, p. 10). She displays this through her caution in her product launches by ensuring they meet her criteria. For instance, she ensures that before the product launch of particular interest, the target audience is found.

Extremity of Vision

To ensure continuity in success, Roddick applies her extreme visions as a mechanism. This is demonstrated by just not fulfilling the customers’ needs, but solving the main world problems by establishing linkages for trade with the people in the third world as well as setting up more factories to increase employment opportunities. Roddick additionally attributes her persistence to the great vision she had for the shop by holding onto the bigger picture even in times of humble beginning (Burlinghyam 11). Roddick, being a leader in her company, has a vision of changing how the management of companies in the world as a whole is carried out. This she asserts can be fulfilled by setting up herself as a good leader. This is fulfilled through charisma, discipline, setting up a good example to the others, honesty in business dealings, social responsibility among other attributes of good leadership.

Conclusion

Roddick acknowledges that a good leadership structure is the foundation of the success of any business. Therefore, she advises that a charismatic leader has to acknowledge the role the customer, employees, and other stakeholders play in ensuring that a business grows. In this regard, there has to be humility from the beginning as well as respect and value to all the parties involved in the business.

Works Cited

Burlinghyam, Bo. “This woman has changed business forever.” INC. 12.6 (1990): 1-12.

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