Sysco LABS Leadership & Management

How has your company experienced change over the past year, and how has this affected you or your team?

Like everyone in the industry, we’ve experienced many changes this year — staffing challenges, shifting work between teams, the return to hybrid working — and while my team was remote prior to the pandemic, we have felt some of the challenges faced by other teams we work closely with.

What’s helped mitigate the challenges that come with change is committed leaders. 

If leaders don’t seem on board, why should their direct reports be? 

Strong leadership through any change is the most important aspect of change management and adoption.

How has your leader helped you stay engaged and motivated? 

Where agility is required, change is a fast follower. Leaders must ensure their teams, are prepared to move, adjust and react. That often starts with open, honest and earnest communication.

I’m very fortunate that the team I’m on is very close. As such, we’re very candid with each other about challenges we might be facing. 

While some challenges can bring negativity, our leaders do a great job of level-setting, prioritizing and getting us all on the same page to bring what seems like the enormity of a challenge back to the reality of its execution. 

That means our leaders are hands on, working alongside us to proactively identify pain points, uncover long-term changes, and guide us through the best way of navigating them. 

Once a project or release is out the gate, celebrating our successes and reminding us of recent wins can help put in perspective that these challenges are just speed bumps, not brick walls. 

Maintaining a positive attitude as a leader is integral to ensuring your team starts and stays on the right foot through change.

How has your leader helped you adjust to new ways of working? 

Very rarely is a challenge that I’m experiencing isolated to just myself. Opening up to others can provide broader insight into how others have navigated the current situation or a similar situation in the past.

When change is on the horizon, my leader suggests we look back at the change our team has gone through — and found success in — in the past. This builds confidence and camaraderie and reminds us that, together, we can do it. 

But while some changes may be universally applied across a team, their impacts can affect individuals uniquely. My leader listens to the challenges of each team member and strives to make them feel as comfortable as possible. 

Through regular one-on-one meetings, they check in on my comfort level with said change and help me navigate new ways of working at our organization. 

Building those trusting relationships and keeping communication lines open has been key. Concerns or challenges can be addressed. Leaders and peers can help support you. Major concerns can be voiced up the leadership ladder.  

It pays to work together. Don’t work in a silo — unless you are Chip and Joanna Gaines.

How do product leaders translate company strategy into actionable goals for their teams?

At Sysco, strategy centers on the outcomes that matter most — stronger customer loyalty, lower cost to serve, higher fill rates and more resilient supply chains. We translate this into a focused set of outcome-based objectives for each empowered product team, giving clear direction while leaving the approach to them. As part of this, we are training the product team to use AI tools that streamline the creation of product requirements, prototypes, designs and related artifacts, accelerating the path from insight to validated solutions. Teams own the solutions; leadership supplies the context and priorities.

What does collaboration between product, engineering, and design look like at Sysco LABS?

Product, design and engineering work together as a trio from the first problem statement through live experiments. They share accountability for results rather than handing work off in sequence. AI supports the collaboration by enabling faster prototyping and data synthesis, allowing the team to explore more options and set aside weaker ideas earlier. Domain knowledge of foodservice operators, along with judgment on usability and practicality, stays with the people — and AI acts as a strong assistant that strengthens the partnership without replacing it.

How do you maintain alignment and creativity while scaling or launching new initiatives?

Alignment comes from shared strategy, customer evidence and success metrics. Creativity comes from empowerment: Once the desired outcome is clear, teams decide how best to achieve it. When we scale or launch new work, we keep teams small and cross-functional and measure progress continuously. This approach supports both steady progress and inventive thinking as the organization grows.