4.3 Is there a future for leadership as we know it?

If we look into the long, long term, I think we're seeing some significant macro changes in the world of work, not least of which is that we're seeing fewer and fewer permanent, structured hierarchies, the traditional ones where we had a senior leader at the top and then middle managers and first line managers and the troops in a pyramid. I think we're seeing less of that. Certainly generationally, fewer people want to work in those environments. We're also seeing much more, particularly if you look at the likes of Silicon Valley, where people are coming together in nonhierarchical formats. So you and I might work together on one project where you're the leader, and we'll come together and work on that and then disassemble. And then in another, we'll come together, and I'll be the leader, because I've got the expertise, and you'll support me. And then we'll disassemble. So this kind of project-based working, matrix-based working, is much more fluid and makes much better use of people's skills and individual talents. People can be assigned to particular projects that require expertise and then disassembled as project teams. So that gives real organisational flexibility and is much more appealing as well to the next generation of people coming in. So I think we're losing the pyramids, and we're gaining clusters of matrices, which also fits into another big societal trend that we're seeing. Instead of jobs for life with permanent, lifelong contracts, many more people are moving over to freelancing or the gig economy, which you may have heard about. So people are working for lots of different people on lots of different interesting and exciting projects. And they work for this client for a day, or for half a day, or for three days. And then they'll come together with one team here or there. They'll be self-employed or on multiple contracts at a time. And again, I think we're going to see more of that in terms of the way that people work. So in terms of the things that you're looking for then, in leaders, what's really interesting is those traditional hierarchical skills of command and control- I decide, you do, I will confidently tell you where you're heading, and you will follow me- start to become much less relevant. Instead, the skills that we really look for are people who can engage people, and often, the skills of followership, so actually delivering on your promises, valuing and identifying the talents in other people, bringing together people in different kinds of structures. They're very agile, very flexible, able to wrap their arms around people for short periods of time, help them deliver, and then disband and then bring back networks of people working fluidly, creatively, and at distance. Those skills are very different. And I think we're going to see those becoming more and more important in the future of leadership.