Response B5 A 200-250 word response must be posted to the discussion forum

At some point of my life, back in India I was engaged in insurance policies sales in two different insurance companies. In the first company, the leader of the sales team and the team at large were reactive whereas in the second insurance company the team and the leader were proactive. There were noticeable differences between the two teams.

In the reactive team, the leader of the team would make independent decisions without involving members of the team. On the contrary in the proactive team, the leader would involve all the team members in making relevant decisions that would help to boost the level of sales for the team in general. At some point, the leader would even encourage team members to bring on board new ideas that they thought would be viable for the success of the team. In the reactive team, often the leader and hence the team at large would react to changes in the market that would possibly influence the volume of sales for the insurance company. However, in the proactive team the leader and also the team members would foresee the possible changes in the market that would impact on the volume of sales to be realized by the team and establish suitable strategies to counteract the possible adverse effects that would come along with the anticipated change.

In the reactive team, the leader would push the team members to achieve the set targets of the team in terms of volume of sales. The team members would not react well to the pressure that was put on them to achieve results. It was completely different with the proactive team. Though the team leader was results oriented, he would have them as shared visions among'st the team members. Thus, the team members would be aligned to the results and hence work towards achieving them.