Alka Saxena is a seasoned finance leader with over 25 years’ experience in FMCG and healthcare sectors. A qualified CA, CS, and LLB, she specializes in strategic finance, M&A, compliance, and operational efficiency, driving sustainable growth and value creation across diverse high-impact organizations.
In an insightful interaction with Women Entrepreneurs Review Magazine, Alka shares her insights about the fundamentals of effective leadership in the current finance landscape. She talks about fostering team autonomy, empowering ownership under pressure, and nurturing growth in a fast-paced finance and compliance landscape—while maintaining alignment, oversight, and integrity. Her perspective highlights key strategies for effective leadership in dynamic, high-performance environments.
To know more about Alka Saxena’s thoughts on fostering a culture of continuous growth in finance, read the article below.
As a leader with extensive experience, how do you create an environment that encourages team autonomy while ensuring consistent alignment with organizational goals and performance standards?
Alignment is crucial for ensuring that individual efforts contribute to the overall success of the organization. I communicate the organizational vision and goals clearly and wherever possible involve employees in goal setting process itself. Break down broad organizational goals into specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound objectives for teams and individual employees. Cultivate a sense of shared mission and values within the organization. When employees feel connected to a common purpose, they are more likely to align their efforts with organizational goals and performance standards.
What key strategies have you found most effective for empowering team members through delegation, ensuring they take ownership and thrive in their roles within high-pressure scenarios?
Key strategies to ensure delegation results in high productivity even in high pressure scenario is “Selecting the right people for delivering task” and “Selecting the delegable task” as not all tasks are delegable. Further in high-pressure situations, focus delegation on tasks that will have the most impact and can be realistically handled by team members given the circumstances. It is also important that we as leaders need to remain calm and provide clear, concise instructions, even when under pressure. This helps reduce anxiety and allows team members to focus. Reminding the team of the overall mission and the importance of their individual contributions can be highly motivating during stressful times.
How do you foster a culture of continuous growth and development within your team while balancing the demands of a rapidly evolving finance and compliance landscape?
Fostering a culture of continuous growth in a dynamic field like finance and compliance requires a proactive, adaptable, and supportive environment where learning is seen as an integral part of the job, not an add-on. It's about empowering individuals to take ownership of their development while ensuring the team as a whole remains agile and knowledgeable in the face of constant change. Instead of solely relying on formal training, I prioritize making learning resources readily available when and where they're needed. This could be short videos, articles, or internal knowledge base entries directly related to a new regulation or a change in financial software. I actively encourage team members to collaborate on projects outside their immediate areas of expertise. This provides invaluable on-the-job learning and broadens their understanding of the interconnectedness of finance and compliance.
In your leadership journey, how do you identify emerging talent within your team, and what steps do you take to accelerate their growth and leadership potential?
This becomes possible through performance reviews, manager; s recommendations and advanced assessment tools. Proactively identification of emerging talent helps succession planning and continuity of the organization. We establish formal or informal mentorship programs where experienced leaders guide and support less experienced employees, with stretch assignments, cross functional projects. We also work with individual employees and try to create personalized development plans that align with their career aspirations and organizational needs.
Delegation is central to leadership; how do you ensure that responsibility is handed off in a way that fosters trust, accountability, and long-term team success?
I see it as more than just assigning tasks; it's about empowering individuals, fostering growth, and maximizing team potential. I delegate to empower team members, demonstrate trust in their abilities, and give them ownership of their work. This fosters a sense of responsibility and encourages initiative. To ensure accountability when delegating I clearly define the task, desired outcomes, timelines, and standards of quality. Then on the basis of complexity of tasks, I define milestones, periodicity of review of those milestones and give feedback to the team member. Effective systems for tracking progress, reporting on results, timely feedback and continuous improvement is a key to successful delegation.
How do you strike the balance between giving your team the freedom to make decisions and maintaining the oversight needed to ensure operational alignment and financial integrity?
Finding the right balance between oversight and freedom is crucial for effective delegation. While it's important to ensure the task is on track, I avoid dictating every step of the process. I try allowing individuals to use their own methods and creativity to achieve the desired outcomes. While trusting team is essential, it's also important to verify progress and results. I ensure this through reports, presentations, or informal discussions. I maintain transparency with the team about my approach to oversight and freedom and explain that it's tailored to the individual and the task, and that the goal is to support their growth and success. As individuals demonstrate competence and confidence, gradually increase their level of freedom and reduce the frequency of oversight.
