 "Bill Jensen")
The biggest challenge facing today's leaders is that their own assumptions and mental models are not changing fast enough, author Bill Jensen tells Sangeeta Tanwar
Can business leaders follow a set of processes that would help them take bold decisions even against stiff opposition from colleagues?
Yes and no. First let's focus on how all the rules and defined steps have been tossed aside.
We have entered into an era of total disruption. Almost every business, business model, sales model, employment model, and leadership approach that worked in the 20th century is being completely disrupted by new technologies. We are heading towards platform economies, where leveraging and sharing data becomes the key driver. For example, the world's largest hotel chain did not exist until a few years ago, and it owns almost no properties. Airbnb now provides well over a million rooms to guests. Also, healthcare companies are now being purchased by tech companies because patient data can be worth as much, if not more, than the next blockbuster drug.
So all the rules are being blown up. But there are some classic guides that remain. One of those was developed by John Kotter and involved seven steps: Create a sense of urgency; build a guiding coalition; form strategic vision and initiatives; enlist a volunteer army; enable action by removing barriers; generate short-term wins; and sustain acceleration.
Kotter's last step (sustain acceleration) is to institute the change. I would argue that that step will be disrupted before most leaders can achieve it. In today's environment, steps 1 through 7 should take no more than three to six months. Any longer, game over.
Is there a way organisations and leaders can leverage past data and organise them in such a manner that it at least substantially reduces risk?
Data are neutral. Those sets of numbers do nothing to help people act more boldly. And, if we're being honest here, most data delivered to most senior execs are designed to promote the status quo - to reassure leaders that the paths they've chosen are working.
The key is to seek out, continuously, data sets that make leaders uncomfortable - to ask questions that deliberately question your company's current practices and then facilitate difficult conversations to explore what to do in response. For example, from my research for Future Strong, when asked "Can you achieve your dreams where you currently work?" 29 per cent said yes, but that included senior executives, entrepreneurs, and start-up companies. When examining the mainstream workforce, positive results fell to 9.8 per cent. This is not acceptable to millennials, who already have or will soon (depending on your industry) reach the tipping point of more than 50 per cent of the workforce.
So the exact data sets are not as important as collecting data on things that will make you uncomfortable, and creating the space and accountability for leaders to address those issues.
How and in what ways fear and anxiety influence professionals on a day to day basis? Can the two be transformed into potential strengths to chart out a stronger career path?
Everyone on the planet carries with him/her unconscious biases: preconceived ways to interpret new situations, about how things should be, and how to respond in one's self-interest. That's part of being human. Those unconscious biases will never go away. What leaders can do is help their teammates understand how certain preconceived views can hurt their careers as well as the company.
The strong among us willingly choose when and how they will be vulnerable, as that allows them to take control of their transformation through a course of action of their choosing. That means working together as a team to leap into new businesses and new ways of working before you're comfortable, without being able to mitigate all the risks. That will force your team to do real-time risk assessments, and decision-making, much faster than you used to. That proactive strategy - failing fast, failing forward - is the best strategy for today's disruptive environment.
You said how you decide is as important as what you decide. Could you elaborate on that statement with an example?
Conventional wisdom is that many of your best and most loyal customers (and, by the way, employees too), became that loyal in how you handled them and their needs when they were dissatisfied. That insight applies to all of life, as well as how you make all business decisions.
Your decisions impact other people. The process of making your decisions - how inclusive you were, how people had a chance to contribute, the factors you weighed etc. - will absolutely impact people's perceptions, attitudes and actions once you've made your decision. Most people will rally behind you - as customers, or as employees, or as communities, or as stockholders - if they believe their needs were considered in how you arrived at your decision.
Is there a way for leaders to figure out if they missed any of these cohorts and their concerns?
Here are two game-changing starting points. Success goes to leaders who jump outside their comfort zone. Human capacity is maxed out with today's 20th century hierarchies, people and performance systems. To realise your firm's truly limitless capacity, you must disrupt and reimagine those systems, long before best practices are established or all the risks have been mitigated. That takes leadership courage.
Accenture, for instance, is eliminating its yearly review process for its 330,000 people. Making that kind of leap, CEO Pierre Nanterme said, is "all about selecting the right person", and "not spend(ing) your time measuring, evaluating". I have found that the majority of changes needed to leap into the future of work - most specifically, performance and people management - are outside of many leaders' current comfort zones.
Be schooled by your workforce. The marketplace is blowing up today's assumptions at an incomprehensible rate. And the biggest challenge facing today's leaders is that their own assumptions and mental models are not changing fast enough. The best approach is to involve your own employees. Put together a three-month task force where 10-50 frontline and mid-level employees recommend the top 10 things that should be blown up and radically changed by 2020. Be prepared to embrace at least seven or eight of their top 10 recommendations.
