Name: Muhammad Nadeem

Title: Head of Sales & Marketing

Organisation: Pioneer Systems

With an illustrious career spanning 25 years in the realm of sales management and leadership, I am thrilled to introduce myself as a seasoned business professional having strong technical and commercial skills. Throughout my professional journey, I have honed my skills, demonstrated unwavering commitment, and embraced the evolving landscape of sales with a passion for achieving excellence.

Thank you to the 2,000 leaders who’ve generously done the 7 Questions on Leadership!

I hope Muhammad's answers will encourage you in your leadership journey. Enjoy!

Cheers,

Jonno White

1. What have you found most challenging as a leader?

Leadership comes with various challenges, and navigating them requires a combination of skills, adaptability, and resilience. I faced several changes like managing change, building and managing teams and deciesion making in critical times.

2. How did you become a leader? Can you please briefly tell the story?

I am not a "Born-leader'' I applied and implemented what I learned from my education, seniors and mentors. After my degree in Buisiness Adminstration, I started my career as a Sales Executive and tried to build my sales and interpersonal communication skills, making contact and realtionship with professionals in industry. I did not stop my learning for new skills and tied to adapt the change according to market. My hardworked soon paid me off and soon I became Sales Manager and from there I focused my team building, motivation of my team, apprecaited my team and stood with them in thick and thin. I always focused my goals and targets and devise sales and business strategies to achieve my short term and long terma golas. I always uplifted my team and always regarded thier feedback and suggestions for my business plans. I never sit back but worked in the filed and lead my team from the front.

Throughout this journey, resilience, adaptability, and a customer-centric approach were common threads. The ability to learn from both successes and failures, coupled with a dedication to personal and professional growth, is essential for those aspiring to become leaders in any field.

3. How do you structure your work days from waking up to going to sleep?

I try to disciplin my daily activities and follow my short term objectives. I jot down my "Things to do list" and review and update it every day. I monitor daily business activities and keep the close contact with my team.

4. What's a recent leadership lesson you've learned for the first time or been reminded of?

A good leader should not be a good speaker but a good listener too. There must be 2 way communiciation. One of the most fundamental and impactful leadership lessons that anyone can learn is the importance of genuine and empathetic communication. Effective communication is the cornerstone of successful leadership, and it encompasses several key principles.

I personaly experienced that lack of communication results in miss-understanding and leads to off-track your journey.

5. What's one book that has had a profound impact on your leadership so far? Can you please briefly tell the story of how that book impacted your leadership?

I am fond of reading books when ever I had spare time. The book that greatly admired me and helped me understanding leadership is "7 Habbits of Higly Effective People". This book taught me several basic key principals to become a good leader.

6. If you could only give one piece of advice to a young leader, what would you say to them?

Be a good listener, be humble and take care of people around you, help them learning even if the do mistakes.

7. What is one meaningful story that comes to mind from your time as a leader, so far?

Where ever I worked I find different mindsets and business approach and leading the organisation but what I learned that it does not make differnce that you treat your employees rudely or politely, give pressure to your team or encourage and support them in achievements. It is said that "Employees don't leave orgainsation, they leave managers"

I personlay experienced that an employees remains more comfortable, dedicated, honest and motivated if the leader treats and teaches him, identify and correct mistakes and show respect to them. I applied these basic rules and achieved amazing results and kep them retained for a very longer period of time.