Exclusive Trusted Magazine Q&A with Mohammed LACHKER, Sales Manager @ NETAFIM covering the Eastern region of Morocco
How could you describe your career path in few words?
Throughout my career, I have gotten to go through a myriad of things that have decided and strengthened my personality in order for me to cross each and every obstacle. It first started out when I was in high school, and I would occasionally work on the side. Some of the jobs that helped me carve my personality in many ways. I used to wash dishes in cafés and other works that would need to be done manually and that would require physical involvement. I would occasionally sell bread in a pastry knowing that it had taught me how to deal with customers and indirectly practice sales in a way that highly developed my communication skills.
Little did I know that it would help me be distinguished among my classmates when I got my Baccalaureate and decided to be specialized in Agriculture. It was an eminent key component to pave my path, and know what would drive me onwards, given that in order to step up in that field and come out successful, a person would need to learn how to put the acquired information to work. Which was eventually strengthened due to the multiple internships I had gone through, as it generated a certain reputation that had preceded me whenever I had planned to choose any future jobs.
What was your most challenging experience and it has changed your mindset?
Given that my experiences helped me build a special self confidence that enables me to be positive and very confident about a lot of things and be calm in stressful situations and entourages, one of the most challenging things that made me struggle a bit and that has changed my mindset is the fact that I didn’t have any experiences. I got involved in the field of Watering as I never really knew any single thing about it. The adaptation process was what built my mindset even more. As I had already experienced working in jobs that had nothing to do with my studies, but given that the field of watering plays an eminent role in agriculture, I had to add up and work myself up to grind and do better in this.
It eventually took me a lot to adapt, but i have always been good at adding up value to my knowledge with time. And i have always believed that the more you work in something, the more you get better at it. Adding to that, the fact that the more specialized you are in something, the more it helps you get better and master your field. As agriculture is not a specialty, it is a whole deep ocean filled with information, but only the smart ones focus on one exact part of that ocean to master it, and then move onto other things as it develops.
When you get surprised by unusual or uncertain context, what do you think?
One of the things that I have taught myself is to never expect anything from anyone. Of course that took me a lot to figure out by myself, but the key component here is to seek what you can do for yourself, not what you can do to get acceptance from someone else. The unexpected will always happen regardless of the odds that you may be put in. What changes and switches things is how strong and positive is your will to believe and know for a fact that your day went perfectly well, and that tomorrow will be better.
One of my many qualities is how I can stay calm even in the most stressful entourages or situations. This has helped me analyze situations before doing what anybody else would do, which is freaking out or even just pushing the positive thoughts away and having negative thoughts.
What would be the major pitfall that may undermine the success of a leader?
One of the most important things a leader should consider, is the fact that they would need to learn how to balance multiple things and still be neutral about many other things. As a matter of fact, the mark of a leader is how they can adapt to certain situations and still know what should be done. Without forgetting the fact that they should provide clarity and not be subjective at all. Based off of a book I enjoyed reading named “Six Thinking Hats”, I learned the importance of each Neutrality, Positivity, Creativity, Emotions, Pessimism, and Organization. These six hats are each valuable on their own, but they are more functional when gathered and mastered together.
Given the mentioned qualities above, if misbalanced and misused, a leader’s success may be very much at stake, knowing that it will only slow down the team’s development and positive grind to more success in their professional life and personal as well.
