Senior level roles are changing

It goes without saying that Covid-19 pandemic has turned the world upside down. This has been especially true for business and government senior leaders. The complexity and volatility of the myriad challenges faced by senior leaders are accelerating exponentially. While the accelerating pace of change was taking place prior to the pandemic, it certainly added fuel to the explosive changes that senior leaders and their organizations face both near and long term.

As a senior leader you face the conundrum of ongoing organizational change while maintaining stability to meet current stakeholder and customer expectations. Many of the accelerating changes began before the crisis, e.g., digital transformation, e-commerce, online education and training, online banking, remote teams, telemedicine, geopolitical unrest, racial and social concerns, and polarized politics.

This is coupled with ever-increasing demands on you and other senior leaders that make it difficult to lead and manage current strategic objectives, such as, magnified scrutiny; social and environmental awareness; and employee, consumer, and investor demands.

Two examples illustrate the magnitude of these strategic changes.

Corporate Purpose Changed. As noted in my previous article/blog, Covid-19 and Organizational Purpose (include link), for decades the purpose of corporations was to increase shareholder value. This led to a short-term mindset focused on financial performance. On August 19, 2019, the Business Roundtable (and buttressed by the Davos Manifesto 2020) redefined corporate purpose to one that “serves all Americans.” While a focus on shareholders remains important, it can’t be at the expense of other stakeholders, e.g., customers, investors, suppliers, and society at large.

Investor Pressures. Investors are exercising influence for corporate accountability for sustainability and social responsibility. In 2020, Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock, a leading asset management firm sent a letter to CEOs stating that companies must “serve a social purpose.” He further states, “A company cannot achieve long-term profits without embracing purpose and considering the needs of a broad range of stakeholders.”

Thus, as a senior leader, you are operating in environment that requires you to have flexible business models and an agile organization that can shift direction to take advantage of opportunities and mitigate threats.

For the past decade, corporations have invested time and energy into developing their values, vision, mission, strategic objectives, and strategies to achieve them. The overall purpose was to gain and sustain viability, vitality, and competitive advantage not only today but for the foreseeable future. While the preceding remains relevant for all senior leaders, there has been a seismic paradigm shift in senior leader roles and responsibilities.

This environment requires the roles of senior leaders to change from what they have done in the recent past. Today, more than ever before, senior leaders and their senior leadership teams must have the skills, talents, and decision-making prowess for organizational success, both today and tomorrow.

I suggest there are six key factors to consider as you reflect on your and your organization’s skills and abilities to successfully navigate in this new complex and disruptive leadership environment.

Personal Skills. Having an open mindset with the ability to “see around corners” (anticipate) rapidly and act in an environment of constant, disruptive change. To have excellent emotional intelligence, self-control, and self-awareness of your strengths and weaknesses in a manner you can maximize your strengths and not be crippled by your insecurities and weaknesses. To be vulnerable and humble to know you don’t have all the answers, you need help, and you are not afraid to get it. To develop greater empathy to know and understand those you lead and who you must influence to gain support. Learning to delegate decision responsibilities to the lowest level while simultaneously developing and exercising excellent coaching skills. Being comfortable in your own skin. To know who you are and what you stand for. Being authentic and leading purposefully. Furthermore, technically you will need to strengthen your digital acumen to successfully lead your organization’s digital transformation.

Leadership Bench Strength. Organizations must have leaders who are prepared and capable to lead in this new period of rapid change and disruption. Yet, in the largest and most expansive leadership research leading to the global leadership forecast 2021, Development Dimensions International (DDI) reports that “Only 11% of HR say they have a strong bench to fill leadership roles, the lowest rate we’ve seen in the past decade.”

Senior Leadership Team. Now that you must juggle competing interests of stakeholders, investors, and society along with leading your organization effectively, your senior leadership team members need to also have a strategic, multiple stakeholder mindset. As reported by Tierney Remick and Evelyn Orr in their article CEOs For The Future—When The Future Is Now, “Whether the head of a business unit or a functional area, each leadership team member needs to bring a multidisciplinary point of view that can advance the thinking around the table, real or virtual. While CEOs will continue to be the accountable ones, they will become first among equals—empowering their executive committee members to be thought partners who can hold their own with investors, board members, and employees—and become surrogates and successors.”

Workforce. In the aftermath of the pandemic, many organizations will have six generations in their workforce. From young Gen Zers to Baby Boomers in their 70s and 80s. Reskilling your workforce will be a major challenge. Changing out the workforce to meet changing skillsets is not sustainable. Furthermore, all levels of your organization will need to see and feel that what they do adds value based on their own values and expectations. In a world where they are individually facing uncertainty and unknowns as well, maintaining their enthusiasm, energy, and morale will be a key success factor.

Shifting Mindset. As a senior leader you not only must focus on the ongoing success of your organization, but also how you help build and sustain a healthy ecosystem in which your organization can survive and thrive. Senior leaders are not just organizational leaders, they must have a focus on society as well to successfully lead their organization in the future.

Magnified Scrutiny. As a senior leader in today’s world, you are constantly under scrutiny by stakeholders, the media, the public, politicians, shareholders, partners, and organizational members. Potentially every word uttered, and action taken is fodder for the internal gristmill, an evening news broadcast, 24/7 cable TV outlets, or anonymous sources on social media. Furthermore, in response to exercising bold organizational initiatives, senior leaders can face personal and professional attacks as individuals anonymously engage in discourse in social media and with politicians that can hijack their decisions. As Brian Hastings, Alabama’s Director of the Emergency Management Agency, told me, “For bold decisions that are risky and could fail, some individuals feel empowered to engage in sensational social media battles rather than be a part of the solutions.” Make no mistake, you must manage your personal reputation, along with that of the organization. Loss of reputation can lead to loss of legitimacy and could even bring about the destruction of the organization.

More than ever, aspiring senior leaders or those serving as senior leaders must understand the game has changed and they need to understand that playing American football and suddenly shifting to soccer mid-game requires being agile, with a robust self-awareness with the skills, abilities, and intuitive judgment to act fast, at appropriate pace, and ensure the talent base is sufficient to accomplish the mission, embrace and withstand the scrutiny, and perform with excellence.

Tell Me What You Think

1???Larry Fink, “A Fundamental Reshaping of Finance.” (BlackRock, 2020). https://www.blackrock.com/corporate/investor-relations/larry-fink-ceo-letter

2????DDI, Global Leadership Forecast 2021. https://www.ddiworld.com/glf

3????Tierney Remick and Evelyn Orr, “CEOs For The Future—When The Future Is Now, “Chief Executive, November 24, 2020. CEOs For The Future—When The Future Is Now (chiefexecutive.net).