118: Jennie Petit, President & CEO, TUV Rheinland in Japan

Jennelle “Jennie” Petit is the President of TUV Rheinland in
Japan. Over 30 years, Ms. Petit has gone through different
positions in a various companies including the service and
manufacturing industry. Her first leadership experience was after
her first year in Japan when she was training new teachers who
had come to Japan to teach English. In the corporate world, Ms.
Petit first had an opportunity to lead a team when she was about
35 years old in the hospitality industry. Her main function was
training and development of all the staff in the hotel.


 


Ms. Petit feels that trust is an essential factor in motivating
team members and encouraging collaboration. According to Ms.
Petit, many Japanese employees prefer to take orders and avoid
responsibility. Therefore, she tries to have an engaging
conversation with them in the beginning. She claims, it is
important to take a collaborative, soft, low-key approach and try
to understand the culture. Ms. Petit adds, this approach needs
patience. She tries to be authentic and consistent, treating
people equally. She also points out that trust comes from
communication, and if you are not communicating with anybody, you
cannot expect to have a high level of trust.


 


To get engagement in Japan, Ms. Petit takes a bottom up style.
Although it is difficult to implement change in Japan, trust is
what makes it possible. One of the examples is teleworking. Ms.
Petit was already looking into teleworking before the pandemic.
Work-life balance was the key word. She focuses on having
engagement, empathy, and a bottom-up approach to her leadership.
By listening to the voice from the field-level, Ms. Petit is
constantly rewriting the employee committee and guideline and
other implementing changes.


 


In terms of making innovation, Ms. Petit encourages it through
regular meetings. TUV Rheinland has different committees and
different groups of people that meet regularly. They have
discussions about strategy, and how to grow the company. In doing
so, they are able to create an open culture and environment.


 


Ms. Petit is the first female to run TUV Rheinland in Japan. She
says, even as a woman, you can do a lot if you focus on the right
things and find people that are willing to work with you. Trying
to be open to those things is also important. Ms. Petit adds that
in order to increase female leaders in Japan, we need to provide
training on diversity, in order to prevent discrimination among
both men and women.


 


As an advice for new leaders, Ms. Petit raises two points.
Firstly, to listen before you start to make any changes.
Secondly, to make an attempt to learn the culture of the
language.


Ms. Petit suggess to not try to change people’s culture in Japan
but to work with it and put your assumption aside.


 


On defining what is leadership, Ms. Petit says, leadership
happens first with the leader themselves. It is the ability of a
person to reflect and then take the appropriate action based on a
particular situation. Leadership is also possessed by people that
look at things in general and are willing to say, we can do
something better here, and make a split decision. Moreover, Ms.
Petit adds, leaders should always ask and answer “why”, and
provide information on their decisions. On whether one should
learn Japanese or not, Ms. Petit says being able to speak
Japanese is an advantage, but it is more important to understand
the culture.