Developing diverse and strong leadership teams requires that companies have a well-defined strategy for identifying potential leaders and placing them in challenging roles to empower them to lead within their disciplines, departments and organisations, says power management company Eaton Africa MD Seydou Kane.

Eaton Africa aims to ensure that its organisations mirror the societies in which they function, and the company has a robust set of projects and initiatives to ensure that it helps to develop previously disadvantaged and previously marginalised people to serve in the company.

“Diversity in teams strengthens them, especially to serve the heterogeneous societies in which we operate. The power of many perspectives provides a competitive advantage, and diversity helps teams to make better decisions and outperform competition.”

Kane highlights that fostering diversity in the workplace and supporting leaders from diverse backgrounds require that a company’s culture enables these aspects. Creating an enabling environment for people from diverse backgrounds to contribute and participate actively supports diversity and encourages people to lead in their areas of speciality and interests.

“Our characteristics and interests are part of each of our unique strengths. Encouraging leadership does not mean encouraging people only to lead other people, but also in their fields of expertise or disciplines.”

Different people must be encouraged and supported differently and this can be achieved by focusing on the culture within an organisation, he explains.

Eaton defines a leader as someone who gets results and who develops other leaders. This is where supporting participation and recognising the value created by employees are crucial skills for leaders, says Kane.

Additionally, once a person has been identified as a potential leader in a field or business unit, the person should be challenged to enable him or her to grow into the role, but key aspects of this process are feedback and support, he adds.

Eaton has several initiatives through which it supports the development of its people and leaders. The company has a partnership with deaf society eDeaf South Africa to develop hearing-impaired professionals and an Eaton leadership women development programme. Additionally, it provides bursaries and uses its graduate programme to develop women in the technical disciplines for which Eaton provides services.

“Fostering a sense of belonging and crafting tools to enable inclusive leadership behaviours as part of the daily operations of a company are crucial mechanisms with which companies can encourage diversity in their teams and develop their people to fulfil additional roles in the future.”

Additionally, skills development initiatives, and recruiting and developing professionals from the local area, also have a positive impact on local communities and help to generate support for a business’s work within these communities. This is also reinforced through Eaton’s direct and indirect investment in such communities.

Eaton’s strategy is to implement and foster greater inclusion and diversity locally and globally because it recognises the importance of a diverse leadership and business approach. It also recognises that its strategy must reflect and support the diversity of Eaton employees, communities and its global customer base.

“Our initiatives illustrate our willingness and develop the capacity to provide an enabling environment to encourage the development of talent

,” concludes Kane.