How to develop strategic leadership and win a "long game"?

Business leaders often neglect to develop long-term strategies because they focus on short-term goals. Paul Paul Humek, director of research at Wharton's Innovation Management Institute (Mack Institute for innovation Management), said this was only one of the obstacles to a strategic increase. Recently, managers see and Hugh Mack explored strategic leadership issues, and Hugh Mack and Stephen Kest (Stevenkrupp) co-authored a management book "Winning a long game: How strategic leaders decide the future" (Winning the long game:how strategic Leaders Shape the Future) focuses on this issue.

Here are the details of the interview.

managers See : What are the challenges facing business leaders that have prompted you to create the book "Win a long game"?

Hugh Mack : We've met many leaders. They (especially managers who want to be leaders) often tell us that their feedback on performance evaluations tends to be excellent and executive, but eventually they will add that they need to be more strategic to avoid missing market opportunities or competitive initiatives. They went on to think, "How can I do that?" ”

They asked the boss, "what are you referring to?" Can you be more specific? "-The boss will only say:" Learn Gretzky (Wayne Gretsky), to be able to predict the slide of the ice hockey. "But this answer is far from enough.

managers See : You have designed a questionnaire in your book for readers to assess their strategic leadership. Can you tell me the questions about the questionnaire and the ability you want to help your readers evaluate?

Hugh Mack : We feel that the form of questionnaires is more specific than the general recommendations such as "to have foresight" and "take responsibility". In a sense, we divide our strategic leadership into six areas, such as the ability to anticipate changes in the external environment or the internal struggles of the organization, and the ability to challenge ourselves or question the views of others (especially in such a changing environment). Our focus is on how leaders take strategic action when the external environment changes. These competencies, which I have mentioned, are of particular importance to this point.

For example, the ability to gain insight into a situation with a new perspective and be able to make decisive decisions in an environment fraught with uncertainty requires courage and you can't wait for information. The ability to mobilize people to work together for the same goal is undoubtedly the embodiment of leadership. But how to mobilize everyone? How to reconcile differences? How to deal with contradictions? None of this can be easily learned.

Each of the competencies involved in this questionnaire will focus on whether you are frequently involved in the activities in the options. After answering the questions, the respondents will have a general understanding of themselves. They can draw a small hexagon to see their score in these six areas, and then focus on what is lacking. We will give specific advice to help them make up for the biggest shortfall.

managers See : In each section, you will see the problem through the "rules" (discipline) perspective. Can you talk to us specifically?

Hugh Mack : We've been thinking about what leadership means. Is it a capability? Qualification? Resilience? Skills? Maybe it's a synthesis of all this. The concept of "rule" has three key features. First, knowledge-based. Whether playing bridge, exercising or playing the piano, the rules that people follow are based on knowledge.

Second, the rules that accept constraints can persist in a project to the bottom, not easily affected or distracted. The third feature, as with any other rule, is that you cannot get through reading. Set up a framework system and practice it--like playing an instrument.

We feel that "rules" have all these meanings, but there are also artistic features-the art of rules, such as martial Arts. This is not necessarily a scientific model. We can customize according to customer needs, depending on culture and environment. Therefore, we must know how to deal with the complex and changeable environment that binds us-this is the connotation of the concept of rules.

Manager See : Can you give us examples of some very successful strategic leaders?

Hugh Mack : In the first part of each chapter, we will introduce a familiar leader. The first chapter is "expected," and we are introducing Elon Musk (Elon Musk), chief executive of Space Exploration Technology (SpaceX). He is a great inventor, and he is also very wealthy. He is now developing Tesla electric vehicles. He did take these as a rule. On a TV show, the host asked, "How can you be so creative?" He replied: "Most people want to be creative, but they don't try ... I ask my engineers to be creative. We don't need people with mediocre ideas. He added: "I will work very hard to think of new ideas and think of headaches." "Therefore, strategic leadership requires that you keep working as a writer or athlete.

We also introduced Francis Pope, who led a seemingly dysfunctional organization, and some would say that the organization has many thorny problems. It is hard to say that in some ways he is very conservative, but in other respects he is very liberal and outstanding.

Each theme, we will introduce the leaders we think are very contagious. In the "Enterprise Development" chapter, we are introducing Charles Holliday (Charleso), former chief executive of DuPont (DuPont). Holliday). In 2007, he caught a faint signal that the economy would be frustrated. It was a very faint signal--for example, the DuPont Hotel's booking was lowered, which he learned from the hotel desk; when he was in Japan, a Japanese customer was running out of cash and wanted to postpone payment; some carmakers larger than DuPont are reluctant to reveal their production plans. The information he received was piecemeal and jumbled, but like Sherlock Holmes, he pieced together scattered information, before others anticipated what was about to happen, and DuPont was better able to cope with the financial crisis than other companies.

Manager See : Can you give us a few examples of companies that lack strategic leadership?

Hugh Mack : There are so many examples. Kodak or Nokia, any company that has not developed successfully can be used as a case.

We are introducing Lego, a Danish company that is very cute and very successful in making plastic bricks, but after thirty or forty years the company is on the verge of bankruptcy. This is because they failed to predict the changes in the market. The information technology revolution has brought many video games. Lego is located in Billund, Denmark, and employs nearly two-thirds of the city's population. You can imagine the extent to which the company is on the verge of bankruptcy to the whole city. They then signed an agreement with Lucas Lucasfilm to get the privilege of making the Star Wars: Force awakening Lego bricks movie. The awakening of the force has saved Lego company.

managers See : Last question, what do you want readers to get from this book?

Hugh Mack : First of all, we want readers who aspire to be strategic leaders to realize that in this uncertain environment they need to integrate strategic and leadership-beyond what is now common. The general state is that leaders develop strategies and others are only responsible for implementation. But in all the unknown circumstances, the development of enterprises can not rely only on the real conditions, so leaders need to find good at quickly capture dynamic and timely response measures of the talent.

We also want readers to learn from the stories of outstanding leaders while reading them. Our perspective is international and not just about American leaders. We introduce leaders from all over the world. Hopefully, after reading this book, readers will be willing to guide others.

Leaders who already have strong strategic skills can use the book as a guide to what they think they should do to improve their strategic capabilities.

Original: http://www.managerreads.com/1166.html

How to develop strategic leadership and win a "long game"?