AP Interview Room

How SMEs do grow their own Winning & Happy Autopilot culture?

Dicky Path Tong

Dicky Path Tong

Chief PathFinder
Pathfinders Alliances Limited

Among all the traditional and novel business management theories out there, which ones can truly meet the needs of a company? Dicky Path Tong, who has decades of experience in corporate management, believes that Autopilot Leadership (AP) can be one of the most effective solutions for improving corporate management efficiency, regardless of company size or business nature.

Promoting AP to help more companies

Dicky Path Tong, who has just turned 60, loved to be known as Path, has been actively acquiring new knowledge while busy keeping up with his charitable endeavours and Rotary activities. After completing his AP Journey, he decided to further pursue professionalism becoming an AP Coach, in hopes of gaining a deeper grasp of Autopilot Leadership skills and tools to inspire more companies improve their performance in the future.

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He founded Pathfinders Alliances Limited a decade ago, aiming to assist companies in market positioning and fine-tuning their operating style through education and training. Dicky's own experience has allowed him to recognise the difficulties that companies of different sizes need to overcome, as well as the common pain points faced by company leaders today.

During his very first encounter with Autopilot Leadership at an Introductory Workshop, he quickly identified AP is an effective solution for improving organization efficiency. This immediately aroused his interest at the time and kick-started his AP Journey. "I never knew there was such a happy way to manage a company. The six elements of the AP model have inspired me the most. Although I have been a corporate manager for decades, and yet there is still room for me to reflect and do differently through AP."

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Employees comes first

He takes hiring people as an example: typical company managers have no doubt on the people they hire, as they believe these new employees are fit for the company. Unfortunately, these new hires sometimes fail to work with the team. Why is it so?

According to Dicky, it may likely be the lack of common goals between leaders and employees. People moving towards different goals often lead to mis-matching expectations and the inability to cooperate. "To establish a common goal, you must always put your employees first, understand their abilities, and then establish a high trust in order to efficiently achieve your company's goals."

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SMEs – the best size for applying AP

Among different company sizes, Dicky thinks that SMEs are the best in applying Autopilot Leadership. It is easier for all employees to understand the benefits of adopting AP, leading to its successful implementation both horizontally and vertically across the entire company.

Moreover, when compared with larger corporations, the relationship between the leaders and staff in SMEs are relatively closer, enabling an easier establishment of a high-trust atmosphere which facilitates AP implementation. As for SMEs that have been in business for a longer time, employees who have been in the team since its establishment are considered to be highly trusted employees, which is also beneficial to AP overall.

Building an AP culture through co-creation

Dicky pointed out that many SMEs often over-worry on their business survival, which causes their leaders to be held up by operational tasks. This gives them no time to think about how to improve the overall team efficiency of their organization for further expansions. If the viscous cycle persists, team morale typically drops, as staff lose sight in the bigger picture and company direction. He believes that by adopting Autopilot Leadership, SME leaders are able to resolve business challenges by referencing from other leaders’ management experiences and insights shared throughout the AP Journey.

To equip himself as a more whole-rounded corporate manager, Dicky is now on his Autopilot Leadership Coach Journey. He believes that AP is very down-to-earth and practical: "It takes around half a year to invest in the process of continuous self-understanding, after which you will be able to co-create a customize set of AP culture in order to lead your team and organization. At the same time, you can meet leaders from different organizations for drawing more inspirations and support for continuously evolving your business – making AP a very worthy investment."

If you also wish to explore how Autopilot Leadership can inspire your company, transform its culture, and lead it to success and achieve business continuity, schedule a one-hour free consultation session with us today via hi@allab.com.

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