Leadership Questions

Leandra Thede, Unit 1592 Superintendent

2026-03-31

I wanted to use the resources I currently have to better learn what makes the admirable leaders I’m around tick. This is my overall attempt to learn and grow as much as possible. I won’t do everything prescribed but a lot of the time, it’s just about being exposed to new perspectives and noticing that a) there is another way and b) it has worked for someone you look up to.

For this meeting, I sent a couple of questions ahead of time, mainly because I didn’t want to dump 7000 crazy questions without giving a little time for self-reflection. Here’s what I wrote down in the email.

Your thoughts:

  • When you are in a meeting or seeking input from your team (as a leader), what has been the best way to get honesty/candor from your team?

  • How do you lead someone who doesn’t want to follow/be a part of the team?

  • How do you maintain strong relationships with folks over the long term (through career changes/moves)?

Story time:

  • How do you define your leadership style, and how has it evolved?

  • Who do you go to when you need direction/advice?

Questions about me:

  • What do I do better than others? (what should I double down on?)

  • What can I do better for you/the unit?

We didn’t follow this exact flow or cover everything under the sun, but I think having at least the template made both of us more comfortable with it. Onto the actual conversation.

————start of convo

One of the first things we discussed was her career path. Starting in Sweeny with a GRAD class of really strong performers, she has gotten to see fellow coworkers/friends (like Amanda Taylor) grow and succeed with the company.

Another point was how her career she’s taken and enjoys getting to focus on a single technology (ethylene). Most of her roles have been directly or tangentially tied to that side of the business (process, OE, optimization lead, PSM lead, Ops superintendent). She hasn’t seen plastic but at this point in her career, she’s fine with that. There may be folks higher up that really push “you gotta diversify” but you also want strong performers who know their area cold. If you are constantly swapping, you don’t get to bloom.

##This reminded me of “the bird and the frog”. some folks will be 30,000 ft viewpoints and some will be in the weeds. you need both but you need to be able to balance this across the organization.

In getting to her current role, she highlighted how it was only a “single switch” of coming from the same position just to a new site/location. Double switching (changing both role and location) is much more difficult just due to not knowing “the lore” of the unit and also having to grow in the position. For her coming from another ethylene unit, she knows the overall flow of how units run and what are the common occurrences. It allowed the role to begin by focusing on growing her personal knowledge on the team and their habits.

I wanted to ask about her leadership style, how ‘intentional’ she thinks about it and whether it’s changed over time. Her response was so eye-opening and exactly why I loved having these conversations with folks! When she came to Cedar Bayou, she made a short powerpoint about herself and her leadership goals to present to the team. (I’ve attached it here for future reference).

One of the core points was using the personality types to explain how she will approach the role and what she expects for the team. Being a Blue-Green person (someone who is extremely details focused and deliberant plus someone who is very sharing and encouraging), she really iterated the purpose of a supporting empowering environment.

##The phrase she used often that I gravitated towards was “take care of the people, and they take care of the business”. She also mentioned “refining” her leadership, not necessarily changing. You are going to be the type of person/leader you are, unauthenticity can be detrimental to your team

I asked about to lead a team when there is a new direction/“initiative” or just to get the team moving in a new direction. Like when you take over an existing team and “that’s just how we always done it”. Really focusing on how to guide and not be a drill sergeant. He focus was on being open and transparent, spending a lot of her energy in explaining. The goal is to make them have an active part in the journey. Once they get ownership, then it can run on its own legs. But your job is to help bridge it from idea to ownership.

We got on a tangent about when things go wrong, how do you balance “protecting the team” vs “holding them to account and ensuring it doesn’t happen again”. If you never challenge them, they get complacent. but you gotta ensure they know you are for them.

##I’ll need to do more reflection/research on this. I’m curious how this applies in sports. Do you get some credit for defending the team or lose a lot for being a “corporate shill”

She also brought up how she's learned to give the proper time to respond. Often times they’ll be people in your office or in meetings saying “we gotta do X, let’s go now”. Having the self-assurance to take a moment and step back. Saying “let me sleep on it” if you have the time. If you make rash decisions, especially to placate the person in front of you, it can negatively impact the team or the overall goal. So understanding “yes this is important to you, and I will think on it/get back to you” is a skill you will need to develop and not feel pressured into going one way or the other. One of the hardest skills has been not showing favoritism, making promises, or generating treating folks differently. Some are just more motivated to do an amazing job than others but created preferential treatment can fracture the team. You need to be fair and equitable towards the team.

Asking about who to go for advice/mentorship, she really focused on the coworkers/friends she built around the company. Reaching out to SMEs (subject matter experts) or just “trust but verify”. If something doesn’t seem fully flushed out, asking for a second opinion of someone reputable that you know will give honest advice. When I inquired about how she was intentional about maintaining relationships, we talked about building the community of similar roles at different units (groupchat of all the superintendents). It didn’t exist before and this gave a way to rebound ideas, understand directives, and generally all grow. You gotta be intentional and you gotta initiate but often times people appreciate it after the fact. Start with trust and the relationships will build over time.

We also touched on how feedback, good useful feedback, is extremely hard to get and for newer bosses extremely difficult to give! You must be genuinely watching the individual and noting those potential growth opportunities then deliver in a constructive way. She told the story of how Ron Bradford (a good and thoughtful feedback giver), noted a moment in a meeting where she unintentionally stepped in over a coworker to ensure a plan got established. The feedback of giving others the opportunity before taking over has really stuck.

##I was surprised she didn’t mention husband/family or other things like books/podcasts. Maybe she was focused only on “directly work-related problem/advice” but I personally find the wider resource pool can greatly help me.

We circled back to how to lead someone who just want to join the team, “Pushing rope” in a sense. Leandra highlighted her starting point was showing and explaining “this is why it’s better” and also being candid about if they have issues how we could potentially resolve them. But at the end of the day, sometimes you gotta just pull rank. It’s also a function of “how much energy do I actually have to grow them?”. If they are retiring next year, it’s harder to get them bought into planning the turnaround 4 years down the road. Sometimes you just have to have a big-boy honest conversation with them and say “that’s fine but you can’t impact the team with that attitude. Voice your complaints to me in private but keep it from impacting the rest”. Her experience is this almost always gets the result of them at least tacitly agreeing to that, then often they start to see the benefits the rest of the team are experiencing and will get pulled back in.

Lastly, we hit on myself, what I do well and how I could improve for the benefit of the team/unit. She highlighted my willingness to integrate myself with the team, my overall presence at everything and just involving with what needs to happen. She did want to spend a little time reflecting on how I could step up and help the unit more (this is coming back to the earlier topic of taking the time), but initially we discussed OWMP the job work process and how we are in the works to improve the hiccups, this is often from identifying common trends like not locking out equipment and then using that data to address where in the workflow we can adapt. We also discussed the PMs that get generated and how to clean up what is generated, what needs to happen from an Ops/Maintenance standpoint and how to reduce the unnecessary ones.

##I try to constantly stay plugged into the unit and ready to react to their needs. The way I view my role is two-fold, be forward looking and smooth out the bumps before the come while also agile enough to help dampen the things that break in.

end of convo————