Leadership2.0

At LeWeb in Paris David Weinberger and Itay Talgam gave inspiring talks about leadership. While David was setting up a frameset for leadership in a social media world in which "leaders" only make decisions if the crowd fails, Itay pointed out different "models" of leadership by showing us how famous conductors play with their role of leading an orchestra.

Here are the videos of their talks: Let's start with DAvid.



David's slides:


Itay's talk:



A great comment by Ethan Zuckerman on Itay's similiar talk @ picnic (gives you some more background).

Both of them are willing to discuss leadership 2.0 with us for our book - I think this is just great!

Please keep in mind: the discussion has to be in english. Itay promised at LeWeb to give some statements by the beginning of next week - meanwhile YOU can watch the videos and add your thoughts and comments ... O.K?

And so hopefully by the end of the year we will have something great for our book - please always keep our close deadline in mind! Thanks!

So please start the discussion!


Hi Ulrike, hi to all,

I like to participate in this topic and to introduce a systemic view on it. Currently I'm taking part in a education program about systemic organisation development. Leadership and communication (especially in change-management situation) is my main issue hereby. Moritz Avenarius



Hi David,

just watched your LeWeb presentation on DNA_digital and was curious at the end, what's behind evident.com. So I started writing you but here it's even more meaningful;-)
I have just published my doctoral thesis on successful communication within change processes, had to do own research and found out the very same as you stated in Paris: Good leadership is about creating fruitful dialogues, deriving insights from these dialogues and decide on a much more profound basis. A short description in English is included: http://www.sub.uni-hamburg.de/opus/volltexte/2008/3933/

The clue for fruitful dialogues to me is constructive communication (or, if you want to say so, love). I am really excited that nowadays we can use Web 2.0 tools to provide decisions which are based profoundly and also quicker than in earlier times. And we definitely need these technologies as the complex and rising challenges simply can't be overseen by one hero or a group of global heros, I absolutely agree.
But: The tools alone won't get us there, we also need to develop more constructive communication styles to motivate employees which might be frustrated as they are socialized in a less constructive way. To convince powerholders within companies or public organizations to give up their traditional way of leading.
And - on a larger scale - show parties like e.g. the Israelis and the Palestine people that the solution might be hidden in the way how they treat each other in their negotiations: By looking on sympathies or differences. By focussing solutions or by playing zero sum games.

Tools can only work best if the culture works already.

So, what currently drives my mind is: How can we introduce this idea of a leadership based on collaborative intelligence and its subsequences to a broader public, especially those which are leaders?

Bettina Fackelmann



Bettina,

What an interesting dissertation topic!

Yes, you are absolutely right to point to the rest of the story. Technology is never enough. Techno-determinism fails just as all determinisms do. On the other hand, since technology is situated in an existing culture, it's more likely to have some effects than other. On the third hand (!), the Net's complexity means that the effects that emerge are less predictable than for most new media. So, we need to pay attention to both the affordances we build into our networked tech and to the social context within which those affordances are situated. In other words, you and I are in complete agreement.

These means to me that we need to proceed down two, inter-linked paths at once. First, we should be connecting as many people as we can as richly as we are able. More and better tools! Second, we need to be engaged in the cultural, social and political practices that will let us connect more successfully. I wish I had prescriptions for making progress on either of these two paths. But I am watching Obama try to model a leadership that gets past the reactive, ideological partisanship that is so destructive.

But Obama is merely an interesting case, not the Messiah of Connectedness. More important are the issues that my friend Ethan Zuckerman (already referenced once above) is dealing with: How can we get past our brain's preference for people who are like us so that we can better connect with people who are not so like us? There isn't a single way to solve this problem. Nor do I think that we will ever solve it enough; we will always be pushing ourselves to expand our sympathy and understanding. But better to be pushing than to be settled in our old ways.

You ask how we can introduce this idea of leadership to a broader public. Great question, to which I again have no helpful answer. The new connected tech and the social forms spinning around it are already teaching hundreds of millions of people that we are a more collaborative species than we'd been taught. Creating new projects that give us the ability to cooperate will help us to embrace the new ideas of leadership and followship. I think it can only help to change laws and models of business that assume we are selfish and that get in the way of sharing. Electing new leaders helps. And trying to model these values in one's own life is crucial. What else? I don't know. This is something we're going to have to figure out together, over the course of a generation or two.

Thanks so much for your comments.

Best,

David W.

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Hi David, hi Itay,
hi to all,

I'd like to add my thoughts and some questions.
The idea of an reputational Democracy and your claim David that Leadership in the networked world is a property of the community is a really cool thesis and and an important new way of interpretating leadership itself. What came to my mind while watching your statement is following; how whould a team react if you would degrade the leader, take away his title and with that letting the team decide who should be their leader? Would they choose the same person?

I think that this idea of questioning leadership and with that react in a direct, spontaneous way to your team could help a lot. Maybe it's a bit heroic and old fashioned way of thinking about leadership and followship but for me there is no doubt: if the leader is not able to develope an empathy relating the loyalty of his team members and does not question his actions without thinking what it will initiate, evolve and lead to - he is vulnerable and therfore replacable.

I have the incorrubtible believe that you can learn and teach how to develop this empathy. To be a leader who can let loose of what you David called a lone isolated heroic figure of a leader, a Myth.
My question is how do we achieve that? How can we implement standards of these healthy, strong and at last effective because collaborative way of leadership?

I think that you Itay just gave us an hint of how to achieve that with your extraordinary way of showing how conducters dedicated to these thoughts create a beautiful connection of love.
(i really need to go to Vienna :-)

Your example shows how the conductor empowers the orchestra to weave this connection through a gesture of his baton which opens up a space for interpretation of how to play. Letting images emerge of how to execute and then letting it go and trust that it will be right without harsh control should be a way of how a leader could motivate his team to peak performance.

Thanks David and Itay for your input.
I would love to get in to further discussions with all of you to leadership 2.0.

Greetz

Jörn Hendrik

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David, thank you very much for your encouraging thoughts. Sometimes I loose sight for the potentials which are already used. This platform is just one example of hopefully a lot.

Still, being not the most patient person under this sun;-) I am looking for more or more effective ways for getting a broader basis, also among the leaders of enterprises, little or big ones.

My own leadership experience (interdisciplinary team with up to 18 persons, being part of a management board of a company with 200/220 employees) has shown me that frontiers are up very quickly, both from employees working “under” me but also from colleagues and peers. The role itself seemed to change the awareness of my person.
So indeed it felt more lonely at the top in those structures I got to know and I could also see this effect with colleagues, friends and so on. On the other hand, I also experience, leadership is necessary (better elected ones, but this is a chapter on its own, I assume).

So the effect of your question “How can we get past our brain's preference for people who are like us so that we can better connect with people who are not so like us?” becomes bigger, because it feels like: "There are less of those who are like me."

Leadership 2.0 therefore needs a lot of courage from the leaders - and arguments why building an Enterprise 2.0, investing money, going through a major personal change process and one as a company is worth doing so.

It needs both emotional and rational arguments. On the emotional side, I assume, there is already a lot we can offer: No need to be the lonely hero anymore, more friendliness as stress due to misunderstandings up to mobbing/bullying diminishes, feeling of trust instead of dealing too long with too old conflicts etc. There are success stories which can be told, others who share their experiences etc.
On the rational side (which is an important one for leaders as they have to rationalize their decisions) there is nothing, AFAIK (but I am happy to be convinced of the opposite). There is some research on effects of culture in relation to success, to innovation and so forth. But none dealing specifically with Enterprise or Leadership 2.0. There are stories of companies which implemented social media (gradually, single elements or a load of tools, integrating clients or not and so on) but no “hard”/ scientific proof that now they are more successful, more innovative, that their employees do not simply surf and chat the whole day long … in short: that the necessary investments paid back.

Citing Andrew McAfee ”My colleague Clay Christensen stresses that managers are voracious consumers of theory. In other words, they value ways to think about their world, and mental tools that will let them make decisions and predictions with a level of confidence higher than they get from experience and intuition alone.” it seems to be necessary, though.
In an ideal world, there would be companies planning to implement social media, coming from different industries, being of different size plus some public institutions. All interested in feedback and in sharing their experience with others. Their process would be accompanied with a rigid methodology focussing on the ROI in half/one/three years. And in a Scientific World 2.0 the ongoing results would be published continuously in order to receive and integrate feedback of persons interested in the research as well.

Because, last remark @Jörn Hendrik - I do not believe in revolutions, meaning the scene with degrading the leader. Successful change happens in alignment with the system is my experience and belief. Which is the main reason why I am so interested in finding arguments in order to discuss/convince instead of state/demand.

Best to all, Bettina

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Leadership 2.0

By conductor Itay Talgam**

Think about a Dixie band in full swing, improvising simultaneously in what is a chaotic, yet clearly organized, synergetic, happy cooperation. Why can't every musical performance be like that? Why can't any work be like that? Why isn't life itself like that, always? Well, the answer, to my mind, is that should be. Yet it isn't very often the case. The reason is that balance between the all essential structure - achieved in the music by prior agreements as to the form, style, key (to name just a few) – and the no less essential element of indeterminate, free space for things to happen in ways unanticipated - that balance is not easy to achieve.

Some musical groups tend to be one sided in their behaviors: If you play 'Free Jazz' you make a point of disregarding structure. If you play in a 'Marching band' you look to minimize all uncertainties. Yet most
organizations do struggle with the issue, using a variety of often changing mixes of order and disorder.

Symphony orchestras are unique among musical ensembles worldwide in their size (up to about 130 players), inner diversity of instruments and professions, and the level of complexity of the music they can perform (that is not to suggest that symphonic music is in any way necessarily 'better' than other musics). Therefore it is hardly surprising that the 'Maestro' - great conductor and often dictator – stood for many years at the helm of this body, claiming and universally regarded as having complete control over the exact execution of what is entirely his (never her) artistic vision.

Surprisingly, this model of leadership still exists, and is costing many young musicians the joy of playing in orchestras, and sometimes even their love of music itself. Very few orchestras (the 'Orpheus' chamber orchestra of New-York being a famous example) chose to work without conductors at all – filling the void
in leadership with complex, often time-consuming procedures of inner negotiations and consensus building. The players of these orchestras seem happy, creative, and many times exhausted. Even then, players will admit that a great conductor - or a great soloist performing with them - could bring more value into the performance. What would that something be? I think it has to do with the word 'Great' having a new meaning – quite different from the greatness of leaders of past time.

A great contemporary conductor – let's call her or him a 2.0 conductor - will balance structure and freedom through creating controlled processes, shared with the skilled musicians-players (the native musical/digital) through the understanding of the logic behind them. He or she would actively create spaces for other musicians–players to fill, and share the emerging experiences both inwardly - with the musicians involved - and with his other partners in the orchestra, and at the same time with the audience. The great conductor will constantly identify and use GAPS, or even create gaps in the process of rehearsing and studying and performing. Gaps in meaning, interpretation, and gaps in process, control, are all opportunities for creative thinking and sharing. The great conductor will keep her virtuoso players at peak level of individual creativity through constant challenge and open space, letting them to be engaged in all sorts of interactions, while constantly creating a strong center of gravitation. If he or she is truly lucky, that force gravitation will be love: the love of music, the love of making music together.

Just like in Dixie bands.

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Jörn, I agree that empathy can be taught, although it's not always easy and it's not always possible; there are people who will go to their graves without that capacity. Still, we can't give up hope.

Bettina, we need every tool we can find. I am not a fact-based person and am a poor resource, therefore, for empirical data. Let us know as you find it or create it.

Itay, thank you for your brilliant presentation and your beautiful comment here. It would be easier if all of life were easier. But, as you imply, there are many projects, many styles, many goals. There isn't a single type of leader that works for all of them. The important thing is to find the one appropriate to that unique situation. The danger is that we'll fall back into the old habits and use a rigid leadership style for an open-ended project - you're playing jazz but your leader thinks she's in charge of building a brick wall on time.

It'd be much easier if we could just say "Here's the new model of leader. Use it everywhere!" But, Leadership 2.0 (oy! Too many 2.0's!) is responsive to the situation and thus may include traditional leadership where that makes sense.

So life is complex. And leadership should be too. You've illustrated that beautifully, Itay. It is hard to imagine, though, the circumstances that would call for an aloof, non-empathic, arrogant, boorish leader. And that perhaps is the fundamental thing I was awkwardly trying to say in my talk: The old style of leader thinks about being above others. The new leader looks left, right and across at the other people to whom she's connected in the network. It's the connection, the empathy, the network that comes first, even when the leader has more of the traditional roles to execute. Leadership is a property of the network.

David Weinberger


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Itay Talgam on:

1 / Leadership as a property of a network

I think Leadership - like Empathy, or Irony - is a property of people, not of systems or organizations. However, these humane qualities only come to life via interaction with other people: talking, playing, looking, sounding etc. The quality of these interactions is in turn affected by the medium that enables them. Privacy (or the lack of it), transparency, equality, danger involved - all these will determine which of ore potential qualities will be tested and grow in the circumstances. Networks may enable or promote different behaviors, and forbid or punish others. Leadership, with its complex set of attitudes and behaviors, can be encouraged by some networks and rejected by others. In that sense, Leadership is also a property of the network.

2 / Leadership based on facts

Leadership concerns itself with the future - that is with things-to-be, not with the way things are. Yet, knowing how things really are is essential. For a prophet, the facts may supply a motive for what could be a very remote vision. For a manager, the state of things as they are is the necessary base for any action. Somewhere between to two we all operate - based on facts.

Question from Ulrike: Bazon Brock once gave a wonderful, very spontaneous 5 minute talk about love and passion referring to leadership. He claimed love and passion cannot exist without suffering. Do you think we really do need to suffer in order to achieve great leadership?

Suffering - a prescription for great Leaders?

Like every strong 'positive' emotion - take Love or devotion, for example - suffering can teach you a lot about yourself, and possibly about others, but it can also prevent you from really seeing others, by concentrating on your needs alone. So, emotional experiences transform into a positive Leadership experience only if they are accompanied by a sense of empathy and by highly developed listening skills.


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Bettina wrote:

Some thoughts on two discussion topics and a new one:

Conductor – Leader
As a jazz fan I like the very impressing and attractive image of the conductor a lot, especially as jazz transports having a lot of fun while working. Though, the conductor or band lead has one big advantage compared to the “normal” leader in business: There’s a song, there may be even lyrics… the content is given, improvisation bases on this ground. Plus: Before getting on stage he/she has the chance to practice with the orchestra or band. The challenge to play live is deeply appreciated by me (taking jazz singing lessons, I know what courage it means;-), but still:

Does the conductor have a significant advantage compared to the business leader or is there more to draw from the comparison?

Leading a project or a company confronts the leader with many unknown risks. So suffering is - if welcomed or not - always included, but may indeed lead to personal growth of all team members.

My thoughts are: Love for what you do, belief in an attractive vision and – thinking leadership on a broader scale – a company culture which allows you to take (calculated) risks and gives you orientation what the company’s ethical values are will enable leadership in the meaning of conductor 2.0. The one who knows the big picture in alignment with the top management (and/or the client. project partner, public) and appreciates and develops the team members according to their specific talents. Gives them orientation but also freedom by treating them as experts.
So, indeed, good leadership is something very specific which may be perfect only for this special company - but also has some common qualities: Empathy for people, openness to other’s opinions, ability to moderate dialogues between differing partners, aiming for the power of the better idea instead of expanding personal power. What seems most important to me: Creating an atmosphere of trust which encourages each individual contributing to a common meaningful solution. Experiencing such a team, especially in creative processes, almost seemed like a wonder to me. Good ideas popped up like champagne bubbles and the best idea was warmly supported and developed further by each team member.

This leads to the interesting question of tools for talent management, maybe (in the future) even combined with fair biotechnologically based profiles for each employee - providing recommendations or even plans where he/she will get the best of the personal skill and knowledge set. Which may be one aspect of:

Leadership based on facts
What I learned within the recent year is that in UK and the US leaders in politics and business rely much more on think tanks delivering facts for decision making (evidence based decision making, also very popular in medical systems).
Such - more general - information on markets, segments, potential developments and so forth should - in my opinion - be accompanied and combined by the expertise of the employees of the respective companies. They can provide utmost valuable specific observations from direct contact with project partners, clients etc. For this web 2.0 tools can be extremely helpful - though not just spying out mails or instant messages (we had some related scandals in Germany recently) but showing transparently how the information shall be gathered.

This combination of knowledge enables a team to be more successful - if their leader trusts in the intelligence of his team members in their role as experts and peers. They are experts in their field and he or she is an expert in leading which is an own discipline/expertise. To illustrate it by extremes: Leading then is more like a service within the team, facilitating the collaborative optimal output than being a lonely hero who decides on his/her own. Which means that good leaders are those who observe themselves well in their interactions with others and constantly try to improve their relationships - do I interact with respect, appreciation, trust? What do I feel when interacting with my team members - especially in conflicts or stressful times?

So maybe leadership is a talent itself and should be seen strictly different from expertise in a certain field? Maybe good leaders do not even need to know that much of their business field?


Leaders as gardeners
Inspired by a conversation with a friend yesterday I want to open a discussion thread which is not as nice as the visions we shared so far - but important in terms of creating collaborative success stories.
The transition from current leadership styles to L 2.0 will require a lot from leaders, especially being confronted with people who were not socialized by the idea of sharing information but by keeping/hiding it for themselves as a source of power. Or being confronted with those who see the new developments as a threat, not a chance.
What can leaders do to integrate those people? Are there criteria to estimate if someone integrates or not? Is there a point where one has to pull the release line and find other jobs for them or even (worst case, e.g. sabotage) dismiss them? - Probably each organization has to define own ways and criteria and solutions for those who can't/won't integrate. But sharing ideas will help.
One idea is that not only the turnover (resp. financial key figures) should be a personal aim of employees/freelancers but also their activity/sharing rate combined with a quality index. I know this does not reflect the idea of voluntariness. But for the transition phase, my experience shows, each system needs an adequate way of communication resp. orientation until the new rules are accepted.

Which further ideas/topics (on challenges, skills, tools) should be discussed in terms of the transition towards Leadership 2.0?


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There are place, times, and projects where we need individual leaders. But as our projects get larger and more collaborative and less structured, I think that often looking for a leader is just an old habit, and one that can get in our way. In particular, I'm no longer convinced that the concept of "leadership" is helpful in those environments. "Leadership" implies that there's some special set of virtues that one person has that qualifies her to be a leader. In the large, collaborative, loose environments that are emerging, we need to spread those virtues out among the participants. In such a case, leadership is a property of the network itself. It will function well if the traditional bundle of leadership virtues are distributed successfully, and in a reliable and robust way.

<--David Weinberger


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Itay Talgam wrote:

Dear David, Bettina, dear all,

I've read through your thought provoking comments with great interest. It is clear that we have so much in agreement – I hope not too much! By that I mean, of course, that the work we all aim to do in different ways is meant to bring closer to our ideas many other people who see things differently. I don't think we can assume that 'they' are merely following 'tradition' – because traditions only hold if they have a very deep need behind them, which cannot be fulfilled adequately in untraditional ways – at least not yet.

This brings me to comment about the figure of a leader (David) and about the transition to new leadership (Bettina(.

So, David: I truly adore your uncompromising and beautifully articulated stand concerning the distribution of 'Leadership qualities' and roles among participants. I also think that people do recognize leadership when it's there – like they recognize good sense of humor in somebody. It cannot be separated from the person, and it radiates from her or him in many complex ways. My suggestion would be then not to dismiss 'leadership' as a quality in general – that would stand in too strong contradiction with what too many people feel - but rather to create more of it, more radiant leaders and – at least as important – to train ourselves to be able to constantly look to leadership in other people and reward it with acknowledgment. True, it will not be an all encompassing old style leadership – I couldn't agree more with your position regarding that type of leadership – but it will have all the magic and light people look for in Leadership, and there will be a lot more of it.

As for the transition, Bettina: Surely there must be some rules to follow in transition periods, (strangely enough, even 'no rules!' seems to be a rule). 'No bullying!' is a good rule, and so is 'Give credit!', and many others. What do we do when people break those rules? Do we enforce 'good' rules, or do we apply the same rules to our reactions towards rule-breakers? My belief is that you cannot train people to be one thing while using methods that belong to a different, contradictory, mind set or culture. The discrepancy will be too great, and people just won't believe you. I think the way should lead through the creation of areas of consensus as regarding meaning (as you so rightly suggest in your study – although my opinion is that in order to create them, you first have to open a 'gap' , to be filled by a newly formed consensus). Shared meaning should certainly ease the formation of shared processes, and the enhancing of a culture of collaboration.

Happy new year to all!