Business Leader Profile

Frédéric Mazzella
CEO of “BlaBlaCar”
 1. Why this leader?
We have chosen Frédéric Mazzella
as the leader for our project because he creates
a veritable efficient company of carpooling. In
less than 10 year, the “BlaBlaCar” firm
became the leader of the carpooling in the
market, with a community of 20 millions
people, from New York to New Dehli.
Frédéric reached his challenge to implant his brand in 19 countries. Furthermore, he also wants to implant his
firm in new regions of the world, like Asia, which is in fact his target for 2016. The size of the community is a
great advantage in the company. This service is used in the entire world thanks to the real potential of
technology.
Moreover, it is important to underline for the leadership aspect that Frédéric Mazzella has received an
economic award in 2014 for his leadership impact. According to him “being a leader is to be passionate, curious,
and optimist”. At the beginning of the start up, his catchphrase was “the member is the boss”.

2. Leadership branding
For outlining the ”leadership branding” we have combined a few articles, but the most relevant ones
are Managers and Leaders. Are They Different, written by Abraham Zeleznik and What Leaders Really Do, by
John P. Kotter, that help us answer questions like how is the leader positioned and what kind of organizational
leadership Frédéric uses. Also, in the following, we will state out why is Frédéric a leader and not a non-leader
and, of course, why is he a leader and not a manager.
It is difficult to talk about leadership branding when the business you are running is basically an online
one, but throughout the project there are some examples that are relevant in stating that Frédéric’s leadership
style is more an informal one, rather than formal. Communication from formal leaders tends to take the form of
directives the leader expects employees to follow. Under this style of leadership, employees are seldom included
in the process that leads up to the decision, while informal leadership involves employees in the decision-making
process. Even when recruiting, Frédéric states out: “Recruiting is live with the team concerned “. Employees
may offer ideas and suggestions for solving the problem, though the leader may make the ultimate decision.
Also, informal leaders welcome disagreement and though such a leader may have authority to ignore
opposition, this seldom happens, while formal leaders tend to have boss/employee relationships. The hierarchy
that exists in formal settings implies that in any disagreement with the leader, the leader’s view will prevail.
Abraham Zeleznik states out that, leaders are active and they shape ideas instead of responding to
them. They adopt a personal and active attitude toward goals and work from high-risk position; they are the ones
that determine the direction a business takes, by their influence they exert in altering moods, evoking images and
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 expectations and by establishing specific desires and objectives.
“What I try to do is to share my vision on a daily basis with the
people I work with. That's super important. I not only share the
vision, but I motivate people to execute on it”. Leaders develop
fresh approaches to long-standing problems and open issues to
new options. To be effective, they must project their ideas onto
images that excite people and only then develop choices that give
those images substance. Achieving grand visions always requires
a burst of energy.
Good leaders motivate people in a variety of ways. First, they always articulate the organization’s
vision in a manner that stresses the values of the audience they are addressing. This makes the work important to
those individuals. Leaders also regularly involve people in deciding how to achieve the organization’s vision (or
the part most relevant to a particular individual): “Everyone is responsible for what he/she does and therefore
his/her future. We are not in a logic of assistantship but motivation". The success for a good business is, in
Frédéric’s point of view, the empowerment of employees. "For this, they need to feel autonomous." In
BlaBlaCar, values replace the process. "When a company is growing fast, employees often have to make
decisions. But they can not permanently urge the managers, much less the founders. The company's values are
then used as benchmarks. If we stay in tune with them, it is not mistaken. This mode allows you to move faster
and to empower the employees because the decision comes from them. The process, in contrast, tends to kill
taking initiatives. ".
Another important motivational technique is to support employee’s efforts to realize the vision by
providing coaching, feedback, and role modeling, thereby helping people grow professionally and enhancing
their self-esteem. Motivation and inspiration energize people, not by pushing them in the right direction as
control mechanisms do, but by satisfying basic human needs for achievement, a sense of belonging, recognition,
self-esteem, a feeling of control over one’s life, and the ability to live up to one’s ideals. Frédéric actually states
that one of his favorite values that is shared in the company is “The member is the boss”, giving by this the
employees a sense of control. Finally, good leaders recognize and reward success, which not only gives people a
sense of accomplishment but also makes them feel like they belong to an organization that cares about them. “ I
do not believe in process, but the shared values.“
As for the position Frédéric holds in the company, he seems to be the type of leader who is more in the
middle of others, and not above them, by maintaining a continuously bond between him and the employees,
whom he sees as colleagues with equal rights, and not as subordinates. “At first when you start you have to be
convinced that this is a good idea.[…]. And so when you're convinced, you are able to convey this conviction to
other people, to your next partners. And when you convey that to the partners you trust, you convey motivation

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and trust and you multiply the possibilities of exhibition for your project, and this is when you stop the
campaign.”

3. Communication
Our leader is a communicative man. We will explain why on these following sentences.
Inside the company, Frédéric Mazzella has created a platform, which is called “BlaBlaTalk”. Thanks to
these weekly meetings, it is easier to know exactly what everyone wants.
Moreover, during this meeting, each department presents the work of the week and the tasks for the
next one. There are three advantages to use this method. First, thanks to several meetings, is easier to know
exactly what tasks everyone has to do. Secondly, it is the question of responsibility, because when we talk about
what we have to do, we make commitment to employees of the company. Moreover, these meetings allow
explaining briefly your job and summarizing in what your day consists. The last, but not the least advantage is
that this kind of meetings lead to a sense of respect the team develops towards each other, a good communication
system and knowledge. It is true, each department appreciates at the right value the work and the utility of
others. It is actually a full respect. Also, when colleagues work very well, it encourages others to improve
themselves. It rails the general.
We are working in a company where the job is innovative. We learn a lot with time.
Internal meetings can have different discussion subjects: “how to recruit well”, “how to manage well”,
“how to speak well in public” and subjects about last trends about our job.
Also, “Blablalearn” is an intern video tool where each chief of department explains their job, but also
the job of their team and new salaries.
However, the work evolves everyday and the structures are not adapted because of the evolvement of
the job and have a really recent concept. The shared value is: “Share more, learn more”. This slogan encourages
people to share. In the “BlaBlaCar” organization, you can ask any colleague anything you want and he will be
there to answer your question and learn you things that you did not know. It is a team of spirit. It is the value that
is shared and the idea that if you work together and you are not afraid to fail, you will learn much more than by
working by yourself.
Frédéric Mazzella doesn’t know the name of each employee,
because they are more than 300 people, but the door of his office is
always open and you can familiarise with him.
In a text untitled “The necessary art of persuasion”, the
author insists on the willing to convince people about a process of
learning where you have to do planning and organising. A leader
must be credible and have common goals with his team. Indeed the

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leader has to work together for obtaining the best profits. Persuading people is one of the best strengths for a
company. Frédéric Mazzella uses means to influence people. We think this leader is more focused on social
proof to convince his audience.
The science shows us that you can use other people to convince your “target” because people follow
people. They will look-up the attitude of others to determine their own actions. In other words, persuasion can be
extremely effective when it comes from peers.

4. Leadership styles
Frédéric Mazzella has many styles; two of them are affiliative and delegative. The affiliative leader
strives to keep employees happy and to create harmony among them. Watching one of his interviews we noticed
that his most important goal is to create something useful for people. “You should focus on the good product,
not on money. If you’re not interested what you’re doing you’ll get no profit, and your business will stop. There
is much work, and you must have the passion, passion that helps you be creative and useful”. His idea to make a
special program for people who want to travel
and save money is a grand success on the world
stage. His main objectives were to create a good
atmosphere for travelling, to connect people together
and help them save money for the trip.
He is delegative because employees are
motivated and free in taking decisions. His
colleagues do the biggest part of the work; they take
decisions based on their knowledge and their
experience.
In dependence of cases, Frédéric Mazzella is using different styles to solve the problems. He knows
when and how to use them, for better productivity. Leaders who use styles that positively affect the climate had
decidedly better results than those who didn’t. Frédéric is also flexible; his employees are free to be innovative.
Of course he is responsible and has the sense of accuracy about feedback performance and ability of rewards,
because he knows, if people will not enjoy it, he’ll get no results, so he tries to focus not on money, but on
quality.
The trademark of his style is producer. He is focused on task, oriented to good results and loyal to
traditions. He is actually really amazing. From a funny story of his life he did something useful for people. There
are many points to take in vision, some of them are: people travel at the minimum price; they can exchange
experience with others; air is not so polluted, because in one vehicle can travel 5 persons; etc.

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 5. Conflict management

Conflict has key effects on productivity, decision-

making, and retention and is about more than just saving time.
But poorly managed task-related conflicts can easily become
personal—generating resentment, antagonism, and hostility.
According to Kenneth Thomas, the author of the article
Making Conflict Management a Strategic Advantage, there are
five key elements of a strategy for making conflict management
a core competency in an organization: developing conflict literacy, measuring conflict styles, building conflict
management skills, involving top management, using conflict-focused team building and interventions.
The conflict styles are also in number of five, lying along two independent dimensions—assertiveness
and cooperativeness: competing, accommodating, compromising, avoiding and collaborating. Measuring these
style makes explicit people’s unconscious habits and assumptions about conflict, so that choices can be re-
examined and made more thoughtfully. Measurement also provides a baseline against which to chart change and
improvement.
When it comes to our leader’s conflict style, it is quite evident that he’s conflict style is collaborating,
which is both an assertive and cooperative style, so right in the middle: you try to satisfy your own concerns, but
also the other person’s concerns. What differentiates collaborating from other conflict-handling modes is that
people are listening to others’ views, not just focusing on their own, and are trying to incorporate them into
sound decisions. We have already outlined in our project that Frédéric Mazzella “runs” his business guided by
the idea that everyone has to work together to achieve a goal and everyone should tell their opinion, so a
compromise solution can be born. In negotiations, collaborating is more likely than other modes to result in win-
win situations. It also enhances communication and learning and builds trust. These being said, the conflict is
viewed like something positive, because it stimulates people working together in the same direction. But of
course, it is very important that every individual in a team is on the same “track”.
Another important relevant source when talking about conflict is the article How Management Teams
Can Have a Good Fight, written by Eisenhardt Kathleen, Kahwajz Jean and Bourgeois L. Here, it is highlighted
the idea that working in a team can help you reach success much faster than working by yourself. As we are
different individuals, it is clear that there will appear many conflicts, but without them many companies lose
their effectiveness. One study shows that there are 6 tactics
for managing interpersonal conflicts. You have to focus on
facts- it encourages people to focus on issues, not
personalities. Also, you have to multiply the alternatives,
create common goals (members of a team like to compete,

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so they put common goals to achieve them), use humor ( good companies go on when managers and their
colleagues are not stressed and they’re ready to solve fast all the problems) and balance the power structure
(create a sense of fairness by balancing power within the team). The last one is to seek consensus with
qualification, which is a two-step process: managers talk over an issue and try to reach consensus- if they can,
the decision is taken, if they can’t - the top manager takes the decision.
It is hard to coordinate a team, especially when you as well face some issues and some unsolvable
tasks, but it is very important to cooperate and create a powerful environment by listening to everyone’s ideas
and taking out the positivity from a conflict: “I look at all the solutions people have found for several problems.
Each time I have a problem, I try to find people who have solved this problem already. And then I see what the
solutions are, and what are the best solutions, and then we execute on this solution.”

6. Team development
We will start with the
explanation of the developmental
sequence in small groups. In the first
study Bruce W. Tuckman found that
there are four stages of the group, those
are: forming, storming, norming and
performing. But after the second study
he added one more stage, the adjouring.
Now I will make a brief definition of
each stage so we can see which of the stage fits the best our leader and his leadership style. Starting with forming
we can see that it’s a stage where the group is just starting to be together. The specific characteristics are,
anxiety, uncertainty. The focus of the team in this stage is to become a family, for this reason they avoid
personal opinions and conflicts. Storming is the following stage- conflict and competition are at its greatest. All
members have an increased need for clarification. The third stage is norming, when the group becomes a
cohesive unit. A sense of community is established and the group remains focused on group’s goal. In this stage
members are flexible and leadership is shared. Performing is the fourth stage, characterized by high productivity
and high level of autonomy in decision-making. Problem solving, experimentation and testing possible ways are
increased because members are focused on the achievement of the task. The last stage is adjouring, when there is
a disengagement. The group is anxious about separation and termination. Members task is self-evolution. Using
this information we made the conclusion that from all this stages the best that fits Frédéric Mazzela is the
performing, because he wants his employees to be autonomous and good and fast at decision-making. As he
says, “For this, they need to feel autonomous. It’s the only way of the empowerment of the employees. When a
company is growing fast, employees often have to make decisions. But they cannot permanently urge managers,
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much less the founders. The company's values are then used as benchmarks. If we stay in tune with them, it is not
mistaken. This mode allows you to move faster and to empower the employee because the decision comes from
him. The way, in contrast, tend to kill taking initiatives. " From this affirmation we can see that he totally values
and needs employees with a good skill in decision-making and that he searches high productivity as the
performing stage.
The second article it’s about the team roles. Meredith Belbin thinks there are 8 types of team roles,
which are, plant, specialist, monitor evaluator, implementar, completer finisher, team workers, coordinator and
resource investigation. From our point of view the leader uses plant team role, to lead his team. He wants in his
company, employees that have creativity, imagination and an unorthodox way of thinking just as the plant team
role. “Recruiting is live with the team concerned; I do not think the process but the shared value;. We have ten to
which we refer in our daily lives, including…Serious & Fun; We are passionate, we innovate”. Based on these
we can see that not only he has a plant type, but also his team does, because he searches for people that share the
same values. "Have fun and be serious"; "We are passionate, we innovate"; "What's done is better than that
which is perfect"; "Customer First"; "To fail, learn,
succeed” - from this slogans we can take many
conclusions that could help us identify our leader and
team with the plant type but we will stick just with
three ideas. The first one is addressed to the second
slogan, “we innovate”; as a leader, he really focuses on
innovating and being one step in front of his
competitors, but the only way to make this happene is
by having creative and imaginative employees. The
second one is about the fourth slogan, “what’s done is better than that which is perfect”; we can see that
Frédéric doesn’t search the perfection, this might make him and his team ignore incidents just as plant type. The
third similarity goes to the fifth slogan, “to fail, learn, and succeed” - this shows us that it doesn’t matter for
him if you fail, if you are able to solve the problem and to learn from that, so you could succeed after. From this
we can also conclude that his team is good at solving difficult problems just as the plant.
So we really think that there is a team around the leader, because he doesn’t want to be alone in the
company, he wants the employees to work with each other and also with him. That’s why he created the weekly
meetings, monthly festive events called “blablabreaks”; he doesn’t only have a group of co-workers around him,
he actually has a team.

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 7. Ethics
It is difficult to answer the question “Are you ethical or not?”, because everyone has different visions
of what it corresponds. Everyone thinks that they could be a good manager and their decisions will be fair and
objective, but it is not the reality. In fact, a psychoanalyst of Yale shows us that most of our decisions are
subjective and would not be conform in ethic point of view. A good manager must improve performances of
each member of his team, but the reality is different.
Frédéric Mazzella is, in our opinion, an ethical leader; because when you are ethical you need to be fair
with your employees and also responsible for all the tasks established by the company. Frédéric Mazzella often
needs more than one string to their bow. It is someone very simple and open minded without arrogance. He is a
perfectionist, and has a desire of excel in his professional life. Moreover, he is a rational man, he knows it is
amazing to succeed, but he keeps his feet on the ground and continues in this way. He knows that each company
has weaknesses; it’s why he said it’s important to be a self-criticizer.
I think it is fair and he is someone who gives explanation of all his actions in front of all the
employees. Each week, one of the six persons in
charge of departments present to the rest of the
company concretely what they have already done
and if they were late in their works. This meeting
does not engage superiors, but it is in front of all the
employees. Indeed if they don’t achieve their goal,
they give the explanation to everybody.
There are few principles to get unethical
and I think Frédéric Mazzela follows several of
them. First of all, he contributes to the battements of others company: he hopes that “BlaBlaCar” will inspire
other entrepreneurs to develop their business.
Secondly: He wants people to keep their own values and to believe in themselves, like he does. He
said he continued to advance like a salmon, although he wasn`t a good student in preparatory studies. He started
from the last and continued to go up the river. He uses this metaphor to show us that people must exceed their
limits.
Thirdly: He admits his mistakes. Indeed it is one fundamental pillar of the company. Nobody is perfect
and everyone makes mistakes. It is why we must make mistakes and after that learn from them. And it is from
this step that we could succeed in our professional life. He is also aware and responsible for his actions and the
others when he failed.
I think it is important to give an example of an unethical behavior to show that Frédéric Mazzella has
a good behavior. Indeed the article shows us that, for example, one executive has a higher tendency to choose for
a post a man rather than a woman with the same qualification, while Frédéric accepts everyone who would like

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to have the job. The candidate needs to be motivated and share the values of the company. For him it is
important to like his job. He doesn’t discriminate people for their skin-color or their sex. He considerates that
everyone has equaled chances to succeed.

Conclusions
It is quite difficult to contour a person’s “leading portrait”, especially when you do not know them
personally, and they run an online business, but there are certain prototypes that every individual follows. One of
the reasons that this leader inspires us is because he doesn’t think only about the profit, and neither does he want
his employees to have the profit set as a main goal, but rather to have passion at work so as a result they will
profit from it. The other reason is that he is persuasive; he did not give up even though this business was risky
and he did not succeed at first.
Frédéric Mazzella is indeed a leader, and one that fits all the positive characteristics. At a relatively
young age, he is already an example in the business world, with a company that is constantly growing every
year. It does not come as a surprise, since this young entrepreneur mastered the coordination of his team to
perfection, and, more importantly, succeeded to work along with his employees, placing himself at the same
hierarchy level, motivating them, personally engaging with them and avoiding any biases or discrimination
caused by sex, age, or nationality. Also, he is a flexible leader, always looking for new ideas to improve the
organization and to create a pleasant atmosphere where everyone can express their selves. The fact that he seeks
the answers from others that have faced the same problems shows us that he is an open-minded leader who
admits being wrong, but without taking “no” for an answer.
As for the areas in which he needs to improve, we can conclude that improvement doesn’t have a
barrier: you can keep improving yourself and the organization along with the demands of the market, and, most
important, there is always place for improvement when it comes to the relationship that you have with your
employees. Although Frédéric’s door is
always open for everyone facing a
problem, there shouldn’t even be a door
between him and his employees.

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1) Abraham Zeleznik, 1977, Managers and Leaders. Are They Different, Harvard Business Review,
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Vision, Organizational Dynamics,
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http://choo.ischool.utoronto.ca/FIS/Courses/LIS1230/conflict.reading.pdf

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28) Mahzarin R. Banaji, Max H. Bazerman, and Dolly Chug, 2003, How (Un)ethical Are You?, Harvard
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