05 Sep Leading around blind corners
Recent commentary around the change of pace in business suggested 18 months is the new “long term”. Whether you agree with that or not, the reality is that transformational trends spread quickly and leaders of organisations need to have their own “speed agenda” on hand, a blueprint for sensing and responding effectively to the forces of change that can see a business needing to be reinvented in shorter time frames.
There is an exponential rate of change around us. If business leaders are to oversee truly resilient and agile strategies and avoid being too narrow in thinking, Board and Executive Team members must be drawn from a more diverse set of geographies and life experiences.
In addition, CEOs and other executives must themselves develop a deep understanding of how the digital disruption – including “platformication” of business models, block chain and social technologies, advanced analytics, and the Internet of Things – creates new opportunities and threats for their businesses. This may even result in them disrupting themselves as the incumbent market leader. We’ve all seen major companies blindsided by change they didn’t foresee, and it’s often simply the case that leaders don’t know what they don’t know.
It’s easy to miss market-changing trends
Studies allude to emerging trends of “unconscious incompetence”, essentially meaning that people are unaware of what they aren’t good at or what they don’t know. Worryingly, it’s starting to become evident many business leaders neither understand or know how to interpret the threats or the opportunities let alone address them. In other words, increasingly Board and CEOs are finding that they don’t know what they don’t know.
For around 40 years – legacy issues commonly referred to existing computer systems to distinguish them from the design and implementation of new systems.
Today, legacy takes on a different context as it can be both a positive and a negative. Legacy data is potentially an organisation’s greatest asset waiting to be mined into actionable intelligence. Whilst legacy systems might be a problem, it is legacy thinking around the board table and C-Suite that can be lethal.
Leaders need a new lens when scanning for the future organisational context. Leading others around blind corners will demand a new generation of leadership talent that is tech-savvy, culturally diverse and fast to think, act and adapt. Most importantly, they will need to be cold-blooded in leading a relentless customer-focus that never gets in the way of how customers want to interact and transact.
Customers have significant power now, and what they want and expect from a business changes daily. The recent introduction of Apple Pay in Australia is proof of this. Its uptake has been meteoric, and businesses that can’t accommodate people’s desire to pay for goods and services with their phones risk missing out, as most people have no problem looking for solutions somewhere else.
What do leaders not know about themselves?
Leaders need a similar lens to assess how their own capabilities contribute in the new organisational context of constant change.
Companies will need agile leaders who have strategic sensing and reflex capabilities, bringing with them imagination and high levels of energy. They’ll also need the ability to set bold visions, unlock innovation at both speed and scale, and inspire new generations of customers and talent.
On the other hand, the challenge for boards is to oversee renewal and regeneration at Senior Leadership levels in order to provide these needs. Or at the very least, they could bring in external voices and subject matter experts who might offer support during transition.
Leaders with further potential are typically noted by their capabilities, determination, insights and engagement, but increasingly they must also be curious and committed to lifelong learning as future leaders. Whether as CEO’s or Board Members, they will be identified on the basis not just of their experience, but of their future potential in a very different organisational context.
This article was originally published in LinkedIn Pulse on September 5, 2016.
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