Turning leadership potential into market growth

Ready for a bigger role

Rasem Naji had been an engineer at Pacific Commissioning for close to nine years when, during his annual review, he identified an ambition to step into regional leadership and take the firm into the Waikato/Bay of Plenty market, a closed, relationship-driven region most outsiders cannot break into.

Over a period of six months, Rasem worked with Elliot from Beyond Potential, with development objectives set in a three-way conversation between Rasem, his manager Chris, and Elliot. The focus areas were practical: client relations, team management, and the personal brand he would need to front the business outside Auckland.

For Rasem, the shift started internally. “Going in with an open mind, that was a mindset I needed to reassert before every session,” he says.

The deepest change was a belief:

“It was the art of believing I should be having that conversation with that project manager or that customer, that I actually do belong in these conversations.”

Building the capability behind the growth

The work was deliberate and practical, often focused on the small behaviours that build confidence and stronger client relationships over time.

“He'd say, ‘Hey Rasem, you're going to meet up with this client, and you're going to bring a coffee,’” Rasem recalls. Instead of “do you want to catch up?”, the approach became more intentional: “I'm planning to come down on Thursday, I'll bring coffee.”

They were small changes, but they reflected a bigger idea Rasem took from the experience: “Leadership is a muscle. You can't build it in one try.”

As his confidence grew externally, his leadership began to change internally too. His team noticed it before he did.

“One of them told me I used to be a micromanager,” Rasem says. “He'd seen a change, trust being built by checking things with an open mind.”

Chris and Carl were seeing the same shift in the way Rasem engaged with clients and represented the business.

Leadership that opened a new market

The business followed.

Rasem opened the firm's Hamilton office and grew it from one engineer to three, in a market most outsiders cannot enter.

He was nominated for the ACENZ Emerging Leader Award, backed by reference letters from Beca, L.T. McGuinness, and other senior industry figures, many of whom, he admits, he had been nervous to approach.