Leading Through A Future Shift

There are certain moments when the future invades the present in a mind-bending way. A moment when the old consensus and the new realities stand in conflict. That imagined future that had existed for some, now is the reality for many. And it leaves us with a sense of disorientation.

Every institution is groaning under this shift. AI may be the thing that is causing the new anxiety, but the change is actually much more pervasive. It is not just a new technology that is the cause of our apprehension. It is deeper; it crosses all borders.

How do you lead through the future shift we are in?

I faced a similar challenge when I moved to Utah in 2000. I led a typical Presbyterian congregation in a culture very different from the one in which my Protestant church made sense. I had a choice. Stay in the old world and comfort myself with how I was preserving the tradition or adapt. The shift did not mean that I abandoned my heritage and values, but it meant that I had to alter my posture. If I wanted to have more than a remnant influence or just become a religious Williamsburg, I had to understand the new world I lived in. I learned a lot in the 16 years in Salt Lake City about how organizations can adapt and thrive in a world they had never imagined.

How do you lead when your company, congregation or nonprofit is split between the old and new world??In times of global shifts like we are undergoing, people get anxious. And anxious people are not the most predictable. You won't be able to predetermine how your team will express this, but you can be prepared by knowing that some fear-driven behavior will present itself.

Leaders who lead well through future shifts are;

1. Calm: The effective leader remains calm in the face of anxiety. This is not easy. There will be many appeals to join in the anxiety and doomsday-ism. Even if you are feeling pulled toward joining in, you refrain. Talk to a friend, download to a spouse but do not lose your calm with your team. You're like the parent who doesn't get drawn into their toddler's tantrum. You observe, learn, ask questions but your detachment is essential for the group to have an underlying confidence that there is a grown-up in the room.
2. Centered:?Exercises that make you aware of your body responses to stress are very helpful for the leader. Managing your own anxiety through breathing and self awareness is a vital skill to leading well. This doesn't have to be complex. Simple techniques that ground you to your body are all that is required here.
3. Clear:?Leaders who navigate this tension well will not always have the whole path mapped out, but they will have the next step clearly in mind. Once skiing I encountered a white out where I lost the sense of up and down. But there were orange flags on the slope to guide people down. I could only see one flag at a time, but that was enough to get a sense of where I was and where I needed to go next. You, as a leader, set those flags out for your team to help them move forward.
4. Creative:?This may sound like bad news, but no one knows how this transition is going to go. The old world is not leaving the scene quietly and the new world can be quite insensitive. Your organization in order to survive, will need to be nimble and creative. Leaders in this space will have to keep some parts of the old and bring in elements of the new. It won't be clean, but it will be quite the ride. Creative leaders see the fun side of the challenge and use it to draw their teams to perform at higher levels than they'd though possible.

Summary:

This unevenly distributed future is the world we now lead in. It won't last forever, but it is the world we have before us to step into with clarity and grit.

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