Joey Powis
Joey Powis works with
the Distance Learning Team for Rolls-Royce, project managing
maintenance training courses for the civil aerospace business. He
took part in Frontrunner in 2008, Common Purpose's programme that
aims to develop the leaders of tomorrow.
Looking back on his time on Frontrunner, Joey says that he was struck most by the frankness of the speakers and the relevance of what they had to say: "I was impressed by the calibre of the leaders that came to speak to us. They didn't focus solely on how they'd got to where they are, but spent a lot of time talking about the efforts they'd made to improve the overall working environments within their organisations - making life better for employees as well as shareholders."
Frontrunner isn't just about listening to the insights of leaders, it is also a chance to draw on the wealth of knowledge that their peer group have as well: "As someone just starting out on my career, I found it invaluable talking to others on the course and learning from their experiences."
Joey noticed not only a change in himself over the course of the programme, but also in the other participants: "The beauty of having people from the public, private and voluntary sectors on the programme was that we all came away with a deeper understanding of how the differing organisations work. What I found particularly interesting was the similarities between effective social and commercial leadership. This has really helped me in my role at Rolls-Royce."
The positive effect of this on Joey was huge: "The biggest
impact that the course had on me personally was in giving me the
confidence to be the leader of change not only within, but away
from my specific department and role. I'm now more active and
forceful in pushing for change if I think it will benefit my
company."
"Frontrunner made me realise that I actually had a lot more power
than I thought I did, it was just up to me to make the most of
it."
Joey will now be tapping into the new Common Purpose network that he gained to develop as a leader: "Through their 360 Community, Common Purpose makes it easy to keep in contact with the other participants on my course as well as other Common Purpose graduates. I now have a wide range of contacts at my disposal, spanning various sectors. I find it hard to think of any faster way to build such a vast leadership network."
