What is the profile of the business leader of the future?

During the two confinements to which we were subjected, the daily routines of the working world changed profoundly: no more working lunches, no more rituals for choosing the most suitable clothes, no more long queues on the roads, no more meetings with the whole team in the same room - we were left "only" with our tasks at home. We call this phenomenon the dematerialisation of work, which was followed by another: the crisis of purpose. At this point, we began to ask ourselves "is this enough to stay in the same job?" For many people, this work disengagement has led to a split in levels of satisfaction (and almost identity) about the role that employment occupies in their lives. And this has posed serious obstacles to the motivation and retention of current employees, but also serious challenges in attracting new talent.

To stop this demotivation, it is essential that those who lead know how to motivate and create a sense of "value" in employees, even if they manage from a distance. Now, more than ever, it is necessary to differentiate the roles of the manager and the leader. And give primacy to the latter. When we talk about management, we refer to the fulfilment of KPIs, objectives, results, metrics with a focus on the present; when we think about leadership, we are talking about processes, planning with a medium-long term focus and potential and change.

These characteristics are typical of leaders and organisations of the future. New leaders are needed, who focus on the development and expression of the competencies of the workers that make up the organisations, but for this we do not necessarily need new people. These people are already in the organisations, it's just that they are often "erased" behind management systems that don't give space, nor time to prioritise the most adequate vectors and activities. I would say that currently we have some organisations that have become used to acting in "emergency", for yesterday, and we have "managers" who overvalue "managing what the eye can see", without realising that they were often suffering from myopia.

This style of leadership "of the future" depends on management that goes beyond the touch distance and this implies delegation, therefore and above all, trust. The boss does not need to be "on top" of the employees to know that they work. He needs to know how to lean on the team to find the solution, listen, discuss, negotiate, and know "his people" - understand what is unique in that person, go to the individual, to the potential, put more humanity into managing people. But trust is not "a pill you take in the morning with your coffee". Without a relationship, without an exchange, without exposing ourselves, there is no trust. And for that, leaders have to admit their vulnerability in the workplace and have to be vulnerable themselves, realising that this characteristic is not a sign of weakness, quite the contrary.

Interestingly, the pandemic has also enhanced these new relationships. Many people remember the time when online meetings were interrupted by screaming children, doorbells and parcel deliveries, pets asking for affection. Suddenly, the bosses were human too, they also had cats that walked in front of the screen, dogs that barked, neighbours who did construction work in the morning. The fear of the pandemic forced us to orient ourselves in an unpremeditated chaos, and, very quickly, similarities between hierarchical levels emerged. We saw moments of genuine sharing, teamwork and concern for others during this phase. These circumstances brought us closer together and showed us that it is possible to manage culture and team without being together five days a week, eight hours a day, face to face. You just need to create moments of culture that ensures trust.

And it was the fact that we managed to organise ourselves in this chaos, and still care (genuinely) about each other and the work that makes me believe that we need "new" leaderships, not necessarily new people.

For all this, I believe that this is the right time for change in organisations, so that there is room for new leadership. And in companies there is the will to make this transition. It is not rare that I talk about these topics in my classes with executives and there are those who rebel, justifying that they only don't have this type of approach because they feel "there is no time to do it" or "bosses that allow it". This only shows that there is openness to change. There is also still a lot of confusion between processes and results. Sometimes we see cases in which people are rewarded for their results, without ever investigating how they got there, with the risk of being ignored or abusive processes even being devalued, which lead to burnout or dismantle teams. We still see many of these professionals reaching management positions because the methods they used may be successful in the short term, but they are not the most ethical or sustainable from a people management point of view. If there were more sharing, conversations, and feedback on the performances of these managers, many would become good leaders. And the culture would signal and shape which values are actually important.

In short: a leadership of the future depends increasingly on human competencies, which can contribute to the development of the talent and skills of the people they lead. This requires delegation and trust, but this can only come about if we allow ourselves to be vulnerable and give a little of ourselves to others, so that they can reciprocate in the same way. This theme is not new, the urgency of it may be (to some) surprising!

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This text is a republication of an article published in the Leader - read it, in full, here.