On exercising creativity: 5 questions with AirBoss' Chris Bitsakakis

Chris Bitsakakis joined AirBoss of America in November 2015 as president and chief operating officer. He was made president and co-CEO, along with Gren Schoch, who also serves as chairman.

As AirBoss is both a custom mixer and producer of finished rubber goods and products for defense applications, Bitsakakis oversees a diverse group of businesses and leaders within the company.

My message would be to focus on understanding all the technical details related to the manufacturing of rubber compounds and then becoming very strong on the technical nuances of molding and/or extruding rubber compounds into finished goods. Before you take a leadership role in any business, you need to have a strong base understanding of the technology related to creating the product you sell. This is an important skill to acquire in any business but absolutely critical in the rubber business. Once you have this level of technical knowledge then working your way up in your organization through any discipline (sales, operations, engineering etc) becomes super charged by your technical competence.

I like to think of myself as a collaborative leader who works to help the people around me succeed. I have a sort of servant leader mentality. I view my role as someone who needs to select and develop good people and allow them to exercise their own creativity without being micromanaged. Of course there are times that I have to set the direction and drive a vision forward but my preference is always to set the cadence and trust my colleagues to execute accordingly.

The most formidable years of my development took place working for decentralized organizations run by leaders who held their people accountable but allowed them to learn from their mistakes. I learned early on that a climate of fear in any organization stifles all risk taking which ultimately prevents the accomplishment of great things. As such I learned from other leaders before me that a balance of accountability, trust and acceptance of mistakes are the key building blocks of all great companies.

It's extremely important. It's always a great joy for me to be able to mentor younger colleagues as they work their way up the ranks. In fact for years I have hired young well-educated and hard working people to work directly for me in roles that give them great exposure across the entire breadth of the company. They take on critical and normally high stress projects while going back to school to get their Six Sigma black belts and other Lean manufacturing training.

It's very demanding work but their learning curve becomes quite accelerated. Inevitably these young people get noticed by divisional leadership who then recruit them away from me for key roles in their plants. I feel extremely pleased when that happens and I start the process over again with the next high potential AirBoss employee who is willing to pay their dues and put up with the short-term pain (and long-term gain) related to the frying pan and the fire.

There is plenty of freedom for people to lead according to their own style. Many different styles can be successful. Not everyone needs to be a clone. However, we have certain values in the company related to the treatment of people with respect and dignity. We will not put up with any kind of harassment or discrimination because someone feels that they can motivate by fear or intimidation. So as long as an individual's style is built on a foundation of respect for all people, then we are very tolerant of individual management styles.