A633.1.2.RB_BorutyAlan_Leadership Gap

Leadership Gap

For what it is worth, I agree with Obolensky.  Business leaders are under more scrutiny than ever.  I believe there are a couple of reasons for this phenomenon.  I have always said that leaders at every level operate in a fishbowl.  Within an organization, leaders are watched by their subordinates and their leaders as well.  Subordinates want to know if you practice what you preach.  The leaders want to know if you are doing the right things for your people and for your organization, how you interact with peers, and how you react in pressure situations.  Subordinates want to know if you are the real deal or if you are all talk.  Leaders are sizing you up as well.  They want to know if you are getting things done or spinning your wheels…they are looking for potential.  This scrutiny is internal and has always been present.  The leader is earning respect and credibility, or not.  If the leader fails the fishbowl test, it is extremely difficult to reverse the effects.  This scrutiny comes from within the organization by people that know you.  You may get a second chance to prove yourself and you may not.  External scrutiny is more critical.

Now to the questions Obolensky asked to begin chapter one.

Has my own attitude to leaders changed in my life, and if so how?

Of course it has.  As a kid, I was told I was a natural leader.  I did not know what that meant and no one that ever said it took the time to elaborate.  So I ignored it, but in the back of my mind I really wanted to understand it.  I was just a kid that liked to play baseball, no different than any of my friends.  In grade school I learned about people that were referred to as leaders, most of them were past presidents.  Still no one explained what a leader is.  There were not any classes that taught it and when I asked I got looks as if I should already know.  Most of the time the response, if I got one at all, was simply more names of people (most of them dead) that were considered to be great leaders.  Good to know, but not what I was looking for.  In high school, I became aware that there were things other than baseball that were worthy of my attention.  I began to formulate my own opinion.  Leaders were outgoing, opinionated, vocal, focused on an important cause, and intelligent.  I was none of those things.  The natural leader label made less sense than ever.  My opinion, right or wrong, was that leader was a title that I could not achieve, nor did I want to…I was not that kind of person.  I joined the Air Force at age twenty and immediately learned that leaders were not very nice and if one of them wanted to talk to me, I had done something wrong.  I only started to acquire an understanding of leadership after I was assigned my first trainee.  It has been a passion ever since.

 If we take as a starting point the attitude to those in authority/leaders as held by your grandparents, and then look at those attitudes held by your parents, and then by you, and then by a younger generation, is there a changing trend?  If so, what is it?

My grandparents lived through two world wars, the great depression, and Korea.  Leaders brought them through those events and leaders provided them with the vast majority of the information they got.  The people of my grandparents’ generation revered and trusted their leaders.  They had faith that leaders acted in the best interest of the people they served.  Information contrary to that was simply not available to them.  My parents were, of course, raised by their parents and rarely questioned authority.  They were young but they watched the country unite when we entered World War II.  Everyone that was not fighting was supporting the effort in one way or another.  They trusted that their leaders were informed, capable, and making the right decisions for the right reasons.  They also saw the rebuilding of our nation after the war ended.  Leaders had guided them through hard times into relative prosperity.  Information was more available but it was generally inert.  My generation got to watch Vietnam on television.  We saw people protesting against the actions and decisions of our leaders.  People were not lined up to join the effort; they were condemning it.  Information was available and much of it was opinionated.  Our nation was dividing, the decisions of our leaders were questioned and defiantly opposed.  Information was still slow and some of it censored, but footage from the war fueled the opposition.  Leadership behavior was in the news and being questioned.  I believe my generation was the point where blind trust that leaders were above reproach began to turn to questions of trustworthiness.  All of this is my opinion based on my observations and what little understanding I have on human behavior.  

Since the days of my grandparents, leadership philosophy, structure, and style remained the same.  The hierarchical, top-down organization still the norm.  Nothing had challenged it enough to consider any other options.  Advancements in technology began to accelerate in the 1970s and has not slowed since.  These rapid advances in technology changed everything.  The generation of my children have never known a day without rapidly changing technology.  Information has always been at their fingertips.  They are comfortable in this environment and know how to use it.  My generation and certainly generations before mine still struggle to make sense of it.  In the meantime change continues and the younger generations change right along with it.  As a result, they are well informed, they have an opinion, and they expect their voice to be heard (Obolensky, 2014).  CEOs in hierarchically structured organizations were left behind.  Everything changed for them.  Their business was now more complex, uncertain, and unpredictable (Obolensky, 2014).  The context within which they lead changed into the complex and chaotic domains (Snowden & Boone, 2007).  Today, employees are better informed and have high expectations from their leader.  

I definitely see a trend.  In the days of my grandparents it was blind trust and absolute respect.  The trend moves downward until it reaches the younger generation where it becomes earn our trust and respect.   An upward trend over the same time frame could also be observed if we looked at the availability, accessibility, and accuracy of information to the general public.  Information is powerful.  Obolensky calls this trend the death of deference.  "We hold our leaders to account more now than we have done.  In the past we assumed they were more capable than us and we were therefore happy to follow.  However, with the fast pace of change..., the older generation has been left behind more than ever before" (Obolensky, 2014, p. 4). 

Additionally, while we live in a world with more information about leadership and leadership practices why is it that we have an apparent gap in the quality of our leaders and how do you think we can close this gap?

It is true that there is more information, courses, consultants, and executive coaches available to the leader, but there are a few reasons that can account for the gap.  I am not sure the gap is in the quality of our leaders.  Before the world changed they were arguably some of the best.  The gap, in my opinion, lies in the leader's ability or desire to completely change their views on leadership.  For many leaders this is difficult, at best, regardless of the information available to support such a change.  But the fact is what used to work no longer does. The environmental context for leadership has changed to the point that hierarchical leadership in some industries is ineffective if not obsolete.  In those cases a dynamic and sustainable way to stay ahead must be developed.  Those leaders will have to adapt or they will fail (Reeves & Deimler, 2011).  Obolensky (2014) tells us that polyarchy and Complex Adaptive Leadership is the way forward.  There is a large learning curve in the transition to a polyarchic leadership philosophy.  Given the pace and volume of change that has taken place and the fact that there is no end in sight, it is not inconceivable that leaders simply cannot see a way forward and are stuck.  Simply stated it is more difficult to lead today than it ever has been (Obolensky, 2014).  So in my mind the gap is a leader adaptability issue rather than a leader quality issue.  How do we close the gap is not an easy answer.  While the environment seems to call for a change to polyarchy, oligarchy is still common.  If the leaders are to be retained, hands on, face-to-face training is necessary and it should begin by getting an understanding of: 1) the context both globally and locally driving leadership 2) the limitations of oligarchy as it applies currently and 3) the dynamics of anarchy as it applies within chaos and complexity and how useful non-deterministic leadership can be in those contexts (Oboloensky, 2014).

~Pete

References

Obolenski, N.,(2014). Complex adaptive leadership: Embracing paradox and uncertainty, (2nd ed). Farnham Surrey, England. Gowan PublishingLimited.

Reeves, M., & Deimler, M. (2011). Adaptability: The New Competitive Advantage. Harvard Business Review, 89(7/8), 134-141.

Snowden, D. J., & Boone, M. E. (2007). A Leader's Framework for Decision Making. (cover story). Harvard Business Review, 85(11), 68-76.