Ask the AGCP Expert: Leadership with Tom Postings, Manager

AG Consulting Partners promotes a collaborative and stewarding approach when it comes to cultivating expertise and sharing knowledge. Our current article series is showcasing members of the AGCP team, their expertise, and advice they would provide to anyone interested in their area of consulting.

Tom Postings is a Manager at AGCP, known for his unique set of leadership skills. He is currently leading a group of consultants from our firm in driving product sales and adoption within a product marketing team.

Q: Describe a project you’ve worked on at AGCP that required your unique leadership skills.

My current client is a product marketing team responsible for driving business growth at scale to accelerate product sales and adoption. I manage a team of eleven AGCP consultants who help drive multiple workstreams across products and GTM activities.
To be effective in this role, it’s crucial for me to drive alignment among our AG consulting team and the client team to ensure cross-pollination of knowledge across products. This approach allows our team to continually optimize and re-balance workstreams to better support the client. It is an extremely fast-paced organization, so the ability to remain calm under pressure and understand how to balance business objectives while cultivating an effective team is very important.

Q: In your opinion, what makes an effective leader in business?

Three things come to mind when considering effective leadership:
1. Building trust,
2. Investing in your employees
3. Empowering your employees

An effective leader is capable of building trust with their team and clients from the start and prioritizes maintaining that trust throughout the relationship. They take time out of their day to train their employees, teaching them hard and soft skills to set them up for success. Finally, an effective leader must empower their employees and instill confidence in them to drive their own workstreams independently.

Q: What are some key factors that have played into your development as a leader in Consulting?

The AGCP senior leadership team have been amazing mentors to me during my five years at the company. They each offer a different perspective and unique skillset when it comes to managing people and have taken the intentional time to invest in my development as a manager in our company. I consistently feel encouraged and supported to step out of my comfort zone and grow my industry knowledge and skillset.

For example, when my current client asked that we expand the scope of how we provide support, my manager empowered me to develop a proposal of what it would look like. She walked me through how she approached a similar situation for a different client but relied on my knowledge of the client space to cater the proposal to our client’s needs. Using my manager as a sounding board while being given the creative freedom to think through the proposal has really helped in my development as leader.

Q: Have you experienced challenges as a Manager/Leader? What were they and how did you overcome them?

Balancing the needs of my team with the needs of the client can be a challenge at times. Leadership in project management is an ever-changing process to ensure the requirements and expectations of both groups are met, which does often require compromise. It’s important to maintain awareness and reflect on what we as a team need to start, stop and continue doing to be most effective and successful. At the end of the day, consulting is a relationship-based business and maintaining a personal connection with the client is vital and enables me to really feel like I am part of their team.

At AG Consulting Partners, we believe in taking care of our people first to enable them to bring their best to every client project. Our employees embrace the entrepreneurial spirit and embody our core values: transparency, stewardship, and intention. Founded in 2009, and headquartered in the Greater Seattle area, AG Consulting Partners is recognized as one of Inc 5000 and Puget Sound Business Journal’s fastest growing private companies.