Back To Business As Unusual

The global economic and financial crisis that struck so fast and so furiously last year is just one manifestation of an increasingly volatile and unpredictable climate. A sustained period of economic boom may have masked it, but the world is characterized today by political uncertainty and extremism, fluctuating financial and commodity markets, unpredictable consumer sentiment, increasingly complex global trade, climate change, terrorism, genocides, the threat of pandemics and so on.

Adapting to the 'New Normal'

'To survive and thrive, organizations will have to adapt to this 'new normal'. That will be no easy task. It will require different leadership, different skills and talent, different organizational forms, different corporate priorities and different human resources strategies. And critically, it will require different thinking – not least understanding that volatility is not, of itself, bad, provided you accept it and work with it.

Technology Will Be Critical

Technology will be at the heart of the new networked, customer-centric organizational model. Embracing technology will therefore be critical for everyone in the organization – not least human resources, for whom the shift to the new paradigm will be a particular challenge.

'Next' versus 'Best' Practices

Abandoning their obsession with 'best practices' and thinking instead in terms of 'next practices' will be a critical challenge for leaders in the new world. What's more, within the more fluid networked organizational structures the job of leadership becomes that of catalyst and coordinator rather than command and control. As such, they will need to be humble, emotionally intelligent, collaborative and comfortable with ambiguity.

Being able to manage future and current challenges together, and to integrate apparently contradictory objectives, will be vital. So, for instance, chief executives shouldn't prioritize shareholder value over customer satisfaction; they should satisfy customers to the extent that it creates shareholder value. Likewise, instead of choosing between developing their people and becoming more cost conscious, they should develop their people in order to help reduce costs.

Indeed, leaders will need to work even harder to engage the hearts, hands and heads of their employees in an economic climate – characterized by dramatically shifting demographics and intensifying competition, particularly from China and India – that will require everyone to work harder, longer and more flexibly. The current downturn not withstanding, talent will be a more important source of advantage and innovation over the coming years than it has ever been.

Shifting to this new modus operandi won't be easy; nor will it happen overnight. But there is no standing still and certainly no going back. The world has changed irrevocably, and organizations that want to prosper have to observe new rules and develop new practices. For those that do, the prizes are there for the taking.

Your thoughts on this would help expand this paradigm shift, email me at wgstevens2@gmail.com.