The ever increasing rate of change in Leadership and Decision Making- the three great paradoxes

The secret to understanding and managing apparent paradoxes is in the timing. The contradictions emerge only when a situation is viewed over time, because at any one moment, one factor or the other is in ascendant.

Change is imminent and the increasing rate of change, so far as leadership and decision making are concerned, is highlighted by the three paradoxes:

1. In an uncertain, fast changing world, leaders must provide stability, certainty and a sound foundation and set out and communicate a consistent set of values and principles to make the process of change sustainable. So, leaders must ground themselves in the certainty of specific perspective, before leading people into a shifting, uncertain world of possibilities.
2. Leaders need information to understand the complexities of their environment towards ensuring effective action. Yet the amount of information is overwhelmingly available with the potential for "paralysis by analysis." Further, traditional leadership values are important, and the solution is often to work through a consistent set of principles that enable you to capture and filter relevant knowledge, and then transform it all into effective action.
3. Leaders, in today's world, need to be both proactive as well as reactive, managing planned and emerging issues with equal success. And this juggling act is pretty difficult. Too often businesses are either wedded to strategies and plans, focusing on a long view that may be undermined by events, or then, they are fire fighting, reacting to circumstances, with little or no prospect of achieving steady and sustainable growth!!!!