Writing for the Harvard Business Review, Ronald Heifetz, Alexander Grashow and Marty Linsky argue that the mode of leadership needed for the financial crisis will have to be retained once the downturn is over.
They explain: "Unfortunately... today’s mix of urgency, high stakes, and uncertainty will continue as the norm even after the recession ends. Economies cannot erect a firewall against intensifying global competition, energy constraints, climate change, and political instability.
They add: "The immediate crisis... merely sets the stage for a sustained or even permanent crisis of serious and unfamiliar challenges."
Tha authors offer the following advice to managers and leaders who wish to maintain their effectiveness...
1) Foster adaption: You need to help people develop the skills and new practices that will stand the organisation in good stead during times of change, while at the same time following best practices for success in the present.
2) Embrace disequilibrium: The authors advise creating a culture that creates sufficient discomfort to bring about change, but warn that you shouldn't overdo it to the point where people fight, flee or freeze.
3) Generate leadership: Heifetz, Grashow and Linskyyou insist that it is illusory to expect an executive team to find the best way into the future all by itself. Therefore, they explain, you have to use leadership to generate further leadership "deep in the organisation". If people at every level of the organisation are given the opportunity to lead experiments then it will help them to adapt to the inevitable change.
Leadership in a (Permanent) Crisis
Ronald Heifetz, Alexander Grashow, and Marty Linsky, Harvard Business Review, July-August 2009
