‘Liquid modernity’ drives us to be flexible and adaptable

This month Trendwatching’s musings highlight the work of German philosopher Zygmunt Bauman and offer an interesting insight into the leadership qualities most needed today.

‘Liquid Modernity’ is Bauman's term for the present condition of the world. According to Bauman, we now have to splice together an unending series of short-term projects and episodes that don't add up to the kind of sequence to which concepts like ‘career’ and ‘progress’ could be meaningfully applied. Such fragmented lives require us to be flexible and adaptable — to be constantly ready and willing to change tactics at short notice and to pursue opportunities according to their current availability. In liquid modernity the individual must act, plan actions and calculate the likely gains and losses of acting (or failing to act) under conditions of endemic uncertainty.

This reflects our own leadership research. Flexible leadership is key to success during turbulent times and through to recovery. Without flexibility, leaders will become the ‘rabbits in the headlights’ of the business world.

There are certain key leadership behaviours which enable the flexible and adaptable approach that Bauman talks about. These are:

Conceptual flexibility – the ability to identify multiple solutions to a particular challenge, to hold different options simultaneously in focus and evaluate pros and cons

Continuous improvement – the ability to set challenging yet realistic goals and targets to continually improve performance. Measuring and reviewing progress towards goals and taking action to ensure these are achieved

Empathy - finding out and encouraging others to express openly their real thoughts and feelings

Teamwork - creating and developing cohesive teams within your unit and across related departments, functions or sectors

Contact CHPD to find out how to accurately assess and develop strengths in these high performance behaviours.

Request copies of CHPD’s white papers on flexible leadership and turbulent times.

www.chpd.com

Leaders in Literature

An interesting aspect of leadership that is rarely considered is inspirational leaders from fiction. Naturally these are idealistic prototypes as they don’t actually exist but a skilled author can really bring to life such characters to life, especially if they include traits they have seen in real life.

Here are a selection, heroes and villains that we used in pitching to a prospective client in the book industry.

Heroes

R P McMurphy, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Kesey

One man against a repressive system, he empowers the lunatics to take over the asylum. Is this a welcome analogy in business? If you do not manage wisely beware the rebellious post boy who brings your empire down.

Claudius, I, Claudius, Robert Graves

By allowing others to take him for a fool on no real evidence, Claudius arrives at the top and shows intelligence beats duplicity. Moral; you have to be clever to reach the top and even cleverer to stay there.

Dwight Towers, On The Beach, Nevil Shute

Faced with certain death after a nuclear holocaust, Towers is the submarine captain who gives his crew hope and a sense of purpose to the very end. Never giving up even when all seems lost is not an easy task.

John Blackthorne, Shogun, James Clavell

The ultimate example of going native, crazy John really thinks he is an all-conquering samurai warrior defending his honour and homeland. Unfortunately for them, so do his enemies.

Villains

Fu Manchu, Sax Rohmer

One of the better criminal masterminds in fiction (if a bit controversial today). Criminals need good generals too, and is there really so much difference between helming an investment bank and a secretive organisation bent on skulduggery on a grand scale?

Kurtz, Heart Of Darkness, Joseph Conrad

He's good at what he does but the ivory man is mad, bad and dangerous to know, if you can find him at Africa’s dark heart. Yet the mystery of whether he is a good leader in a bad situation is left tantalisingly unresolved.