Navigating in the complex terrain of the business - and life for that matter- of today is not a walk in the park. Not that business, decision-making and predicting the future have ever been easy. No, that is definitely not the case. Our predecessors have needed loads of reasoning, logic, compassion, wit, and guts to take the world of business to its present state, not that many of us actually are aware of the nature of that state. That change is the only permanent thing is such a cliché that I would not like to write it down here. But I do it anyway since change is not going anywhere. Only three years ago the CEOs (more than 1500 of them around the globe) who were interviewed for the survey IBM conducts and publishes regularly, were almost unanimous; change was the biggest challenge for them in the business, notwithstanding the industry. There was, according to these powerful men and women leading various sizes of businesses, a huge competence gap between what would be needed to cope with the constant change and what the CEOs and their troops felt capable of doing. But there has been a change here, too.
The latest CEO report tells us that change has become a commodity if such a term is allowed in this context. It is so prevalent that leaders at different levels in organizations take it for granted and as a pivotal part of leadership in general. Change, a commodity or not, is naturally still competing for the gold medal but has a new opponent that has pushed change aside from the highest podium. That sneaky newcomer is complexity. Spiced up by the speed of the previous master of the universe, change, it causes more anxiety than anything else today. That is, if we listen to the businesspeople and, may I say, just look around us with an open mind and an attentive eye.
Complexity causes anxiety only if you try to push it aside and try to cope with it by using the methods of linearity and past, sometimes rigid, structures. The best organizations and businesses are inspired by complexity and are ready to step out of their own field of work and activities and laws of their own market and competition. Complexity creates new links and causalities between different functions, and requires us to live in the “both and world” instead of the “either or” one. It doesn't care if we are not prepared for the ramifications of one decision somewhere, and it sticks its tongue out for those who think they can stay behind their old processes and lines of communication.
Complexity also forces us to look at our competencies in a totally new way and makes us humble in front of our own inability to prepare ourselves for tomorrow and the day after.
In view of all of the above it will be harder and harder to define what competencies we need in our organizations in the future, in the NEAR future, mind you. Who is a talent, what can she do?
By one of the definitions of a talent, he or she is someone who is willing and able to make a difference in the organization and to organizational performance. That is by far the best definition I have found anywhere, and my absolute personal favorite, too. Talent can also be divided into three categories; Skills/competencies, meta skills and attitudes. The first has to do with specific skills related to leadership and/or a specialty area (e.g. accounting), the second, the meta skills, refer to one’s ability to learn. This is in my opinion of utmost importance to understand; it is not about what you know but how you learn. And learn not only from books, lectures, training and your peers. But also from your own experiences, mistakes and successes. Also; how does one perceive the big picture and live with uncertainty (=change!) The third one is absolutely the most important since it is extremely hard to change; one’s attitude. What is the attitude of our defined talent towards herself/himself and, above all, towards working with others? How does she or he want to go about getting results? On her own or together with others?
The organization is better off if there are enough people who want to make sure through working together, that everyone’s competencies and potential is sought for, benefited from and put into use in various ways. In his book “Talent is never enough – discover the choices that will take you beyond your talent”, J.Maxwell says that working together to reach a goal will double one’s talent.
A psychologist and a brain researcher Howard Gardner puts the “minds” needed in the future into a list of five. They are: 1) The disciplined mind, meaning that all of us need a “discipline”, academic or not, where we are good and where we can aim at mastery so to say 2) The synthesizing mind; in the world of complexity and limitless information it is important to make synthesis for e.g. organizations to act upon, to define goals and communicate them to others 3) A creative mind; in the face of complexity we need to be creative, have both play and intuition intertwined with reason in the game of business 4) The respectful mind; only if we truly understand and appreciate diversity can we be respected citizens, corporate or individual, ourselves. And last but not least 5) The ethical mind. I totally agree with Gardner on all of the five.
Coming back to the compass that appears in the name of this post. And intuition that intrigues and fascinates me personally and is, by the way, one of the main topics in the latest issue of Profile magazine. Highly recommended for instant reading! A French-American consultant and author of the book The Intuitive Compass, Francis P. Cholle combines the two aforementioned things.
Cholle charts a compass that has reason in the North, instinct (intuition) in the South, results in the East and play in the West. He carefully studies the “in between areas”, NE, NW, SE, SW and explains how we in different functions use different thinking, typically one of the combinations in between ones. We have been, he claims and in this is very much walking in the footsteps of Gary Hamel, that we have been using the NE thinking until now (using reason and focusing on results) reaching powerful results. He states that that is not enough anymore in the 21st century where challenges are more complex and “a creative and agile business mindset is required to reach powerful innovative solutions”. Once again, I totally agree.
The five minds discussed above together with respecting and taking seriously also the decisions based not solely on reason but on intuition, too are some of the important factors in the brave new complex world of business. Being able to communicate and influence are in the core when discussing competencies needed in organizations. For those competencies to come about, one needs to be deeply aware of oneself and have self-confidence. I guess we would all benefit from a compass that helps us use all the power of reason, intuition, play (= creativeness) and results without losing sight of one when using the other. It all depends on where we wonder and what we want to achieve. And once again: Not either reason or intuition etc. but both and, my friends.
I finish with the words of a famous man: “The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.” Albert Einstein.
Allow your intuition to have a say in your decisions folks, and enjoy the play!
Until next time, yours. Riitta
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