Leadershift

About the Author

Emmanuel Gobillot is a thought leader in the field of organizational effectiveness and leadership. His career spans over a decade of consulting and advising senior executives on how to navigate the complexities of modern business environments. Gobillot's work is renowned for its focus on the human aspects of organizational life, emphasizing the importance of communication, collaboration, and community. His previous book, The Connected Leader, explored the role of networks and relationships in effective leadership. In Leadershift, Gobillot builds on these ideas, presenting a vision of leadership that is adaptable, inclusive, and geared towards fostering mass collaboration.

Main Idea

"Leadershift: Reinventing Leadership for the Age of Mass Collaboration" explores how traditional leadership models are becoming outdated in the face of rapid technological advancements and cultural shifts. Gobillot argues that the old paradigms of hierarchical, top-down leadership are ill-suited to the modern world, where collaboration, flexibility, and shared leadership are increasingly important. He introduces the concept of "leadershift," which emphasizes the need for leaders to move away from controlling and directive roles towards facilitating and enabling roles. This new model of leadership is not just a change in style but a fundamental rethinking of what it means to lead in a connected and collaborative world.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction: The Age of Mass Collaboration
2. The Four Critical Trends Shaping Leadership
3. The Role of the Leader in the New Era
4. From Clarity to Simplicity
5. From Plans to Narratives
6. From Roles to Tasks
7. From Money to Love
8. The Elvis Fallacy and Beyond
9. Concluding Thoughts: The Future of Leadership

The Four Critical Trends Shaping Leadership

Gobillot identifies four critical trends that are fundamentally transforming the nature of leadership: the Demographic, Expertise, Attention, and Democratic trends. These trends, collectively referred to as the "DEAD" trends, highlight the limitations of traditional leadership models and underscore the need for a new approach.

The Demographic Trend

This trend highlights the growing diversity within organizations, characterized by multiple generations working together, each with its unique values, expectations, and communication styles. Gobillot notes that this diversity can lead to a "clash of experience," where the differing backgrounds and life experiences of team members create challenges in understanding and collaboration. He emphasizes that leaders must develop cultural competence and empathy to bridge these gaps and create an inclusive environment. The need for a diverse leadership pipeline is also critical, as many senior leaders approach retirement, necessitating a new generation of leaders who can navigate this complex landscape.

"The demographic trend means that leaders will no longer be able to rely on their experience to lead." - Emmanuel Gobillot

To illustrate the demographic trend, Gobillot references the concept of "Generation Me," a term coined by psychologist Jean M. Twenge to describe the millennial generation. This generation, raised with high expectations and a sense of entitlement, often struggles with the realities of the workplace. Leaders must understand these dynamics to effectively engage and motivate younger employees.

The Expertise Trend

The expertise trend reflects the increasing importance of knowledge and skills that lie outside traditional organizational boundaries. With the rise of distributed co-creation and crowdsourcing, organizations are tapping into external networks for innovation and problem-solving. Gobillot describes how companies like Threadless, a T-shirt company that relies on user-generated designs, exemplify this trend. By leveraging the creativity and expertise of a global community, organizations can access a diverse range of ideas and solutions.

"Distributed co-creation is putting the world of co-creation on steroids." - Emmanuel Gobillot

In this new landscape, leaders must shift from being the sole source of expertise to facilitators who can harness and integrate external knowledge. This requires a new skill set, including the ability to network, communicate across boundaries, and manage complex relationships. The traditional model of leaders as experts is being replaced by a model where leaders are connectors and enablers.

The Attention Trend

The attention trend addresses the challenge of capturing and sustaining attention in an age of information overload. As people are bombarded with messages and content, they increasingly rely on communities and trusted networks to filter and make sense of information. Gobillot argues that organizations must adapt to this reality by creating meaningful and engaging experiences that resonate with their audiences.