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How to survive and thrive in the age of disruption

Today’s leaders all need to pay attention to innovation. Agility, political savviness, creativity, tech literacy and the ability to balance data driven decision making with healthy experimentation into the unknown are key skills for modern innovative leadership. Contributor Victoria Harrison-Mirauer, MA Cantab, MA, MSc – Innovation Expert.
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Today’s leaders all need to pay attention to innovation. Agility, political savviness, creativity, tech literacy and the ability to balance data driven decision making with healthy experimentation into the unknown are key skills for modern innovative leadership. Contributor Victoria Harrison-Mirauer, MA Cantab, MA, MSc – Innovation Expert.

An innovative organisation is one which experiments and learns faster, more efficiently and more consistently, than competitors; where customer needs, future trends and new technologies are all in play. This presents unique challenges for leaders, and leaders of innovation.  They must encourage and enable discovery, and at the same time know when to ‘pivot’.

Innovative leaders are those who get the balance of risk, judgement, and data-driven decision making, and who are able to effectively influence diverse stakeholder groups. This requires leaders with courage of their conviction yet who are also able to convene collaborators and partnerships, both internally and externally. By definition innovation doesn’t come with clearly defined outcomes, exploring new ground demands adaptive, agile leadership capabilities

We live in volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous times (VUCA) where more is being asked of leaders than ever before. Thrown into relief by rapid digitization impacting  markets, supply chains, operations, business models customer behaviour. We’re currently in a state of technology-driven transformation which is having a massive impact on the structures, activities and outcomes for organisations, leaders and teams.

Organisations are prioritising innovation and asking themselves what leaders need to do not just survive but thrive. What are the new competencies? Do we need to throw out the rule book of traditional leadership? Will the traditional leadership development programs and capabilities leave us tethered and unable to either respond to or drive changing commercial and organisational forces?

From working with senior leaders across the globe, here’s what we are seeing as the most important competencies for today’s innovative leaders:

Agility – Innovative leaders are able to pivot, and change direction in response to changing circumstances. They view strategy as emergent, not as a fixed ‘end goal’ and are able to balance data and judgement when leading teams into uncharted waters. Agile, innovative leaders are those who can move fast and handle high levels of complexity.  They can operate across all three innovation horizons simultaneously, both dealing with incremental change, and having an eye on the bigger picture, longer term, disruptive challenges. This dexterity warrants that they are tolerant of higher levels of ambiguity and able to convene a plan when there is ‘no plan’.

Collaboration – Both within and beyond the organisation boundaries, the ability to collaborate effectively means less hierarchy and more focus on the ‘why’ than the ‘what’. Innovative leaders tend to hand the baton along rather than cling to ownership end-to-end, as well as being able to bring different groups together, working in a truly ‘renaissance’ way – they are drivers of teams which are more multidisciplinary, global, virtual and connected by a clear common purpose or goal.

Experimentation – As timelines speed up, consumer and customer demands outpace those organisations that can’t experiment. Innovative leaders need to create the environments where experimentation can happen in order to get products and services out on the market to consumers and test them quickly. Innovative leaders must support experiments ane help their teams to work with new processes and technologies. By definition, the outcome of experimentation is unknown, so it’s actually about being willing to try new things even if there is a high chance of failure. In the words of Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos; “if an organisation cannot experiment, it cannot innovate.” Google talk about their experiments as ‘small boats’, setting many small projects out simultaneously. The balancing act of keeping projects and experiments running is the new signature of the thriving innovative leader. Importantly learning from the process, whether the outcomes are expected and successful or not, is the name of the game.

Political Savviness – Innovation, by definition isn’t business as usual; there are many organisational barriers – both cultural and structural – that require the innovative leader to be politically savvy. People, not processes, make innovation happen, and being able to persuade and convince others, bring people on the journey and manage multiple stakeholders are a helpful skills. This is also about navigating the balance between delivering the short term numbers and ensuring the innovation pipeline is healthy.  Innovative leaders are advocates, pioneers, and change agents, navigating the ‘politics of the new’.

Resilience (personal and organisational) – Uncertainty is the rapidly becoming the ‘new normal’. It’s important for leaders to strike the right balance of data driven decision making, and to exercise ‘judgement’ when the data is imperfect. Developing advanced personal strategies for coping with multiple agendas, and the ‘stress’ of operating outside the expertise many have built their careers on is important. Similarly at the organisation level there needs to be enough ‘flex’ in the system.

Listening – Innovative leaders are usually naturally curious; to create the kind of culture where innovation can thrive, leaders need to listen. In role-modelling listening and reflection, leaders demonstrate it is OK to ask questions, to challenge, to be curious, and to discuss. A leader who can listen is a leader who creates the space for people to have ideas and offer alternative solutions.

Imagination – Imagination is the backbone of innovation. In a business context words like creativity and imagination can be polarising. Imagination is frequently squashed by organisational process and procedure, but it is identified by the World Economic Forum as one of the key human capabilities that separates us from the AI poised to take our jobs. Our ability to be creative, to exercise our imaginations is a more important competency than ever.

Leaders must take vital steps to develop these competencies mentioned above if they are to deliver truly transformational and innovative leadership. The ever-evolving leadership landscape demands that the most effective leaders of the future are able to move beyond traditional leadership competencies and embrace innovation. Those who thrive will be the ones who able to flex, who are thinking and adapting with these seven essential competencies at the very core of their approach.


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