The word Harem comes into usage from the Ottoman Empire in Turkey where a lot of women would be put in what were in truth golden cages. They had little or no freedom, with constant supervision by either the Emperor’s mother or the court eunuchs. But they would still never leave as the comforts of that life were immense. A lot of modern corporations mimic that approach. The employees rarely contribute creatively or substantially, but rarely leave because of the material comforts. Unfortunately, this is also true for a lot of senior positions. It is common to see job profiles of seemingly distinct positions overlapping at multiple points. The team meetings are pointless. This is a terrible method of talent management. While talent does get retained, their development gets stunted. This impacts on the lack of creativity or innovation at the organization. Dysfunctional, narcissistic leaders tend to abide by this method.

Source:https://knowledge.insead.edu/blog/insead-blog/leadership-harem-style-4680

Uploaded Date: 30 May 2018

A lot of companies such as the Finnish one Debora have done away with the level of traditional middle management. Organizations continue to need to visionary leadership that draft the corporate strategy but requires an agile structure so that modifications may be improvised at any stage. For this the middle-management roles have been left irrelevant, as instead there is greater need to redirect operations along the lines of bottom-up approach. Debora for instance, now has an executive leadership, but all else are frontline workers who report directly to the former. This removes unnecessary clutter, but at the same time the leadership is able to quickly reconfigure as per authentic business intelligence received from the frontline. In agile organizations, managers need to be more humble but curious as changes are constant. More time will now need to be spent on hands-on work, lesser on directing and controlling.

Source:https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/organization/our-insights/the-organization-blog/paradigm-shift-for-leaders?cid=other-soc-twi-mip-mck-oth-1803&kui=zGsrQoOsC2UhBtxNkHzUgw

Uploaded Date:16 March 2018

While it is well-known that diversity in any organization breeds innovation and in the long-term improves the productivity due to the diversity in ideas, it has now emerged that a similar impact also exists in team leadership. A study anchored by management consulting giant BCG has revealed that companies with above-average diversity levels in leadership positions tend to outperform their peers in terms of business innovation and report higher EBIT margins. This is true for both developed and developing countries. This study was conducted across eight countries- Austria, Brazil, India, Germany, USA, France, China and Switzerland. Diversity was measured across six parameters- nationality, gender, age, industry origin, education levels and career paths undertaken. About three-fourths of respondents even confirmed that their companies had witnessed an increase in diversity. Products and services launched over the past three years account for about forty-five percent of the revenues for companies showing above-average innovation patterns as opposed to the twenty-six percent share of the laggards. Among the six parameters of diversity studied, the one with the highest impact has been the nationality of origin, with age and education showing the least effect. Small steps to increase diversity, can lead to a significantly higher correlation in terms of innovation. This effect will be further compounded over the years due to the leveling playing field that digitization has brought about.

Source:https://www.bcg.com/publications/2018/how-diverse-leadership-teams-boost-innovation.aspx?linkId=47315831&linkId=47808322

Uploaded Date:27 February 2018

In the digital world of near-constant connectedness, there is little time to think and reflect over one’s work. This is proving to be a worrying trend of several businesses, as they try to devise ways to respond to business urgencies without losing the capability to think over. A recent study held by PwC highlights this problem as CEOs worldwide have addressed key challenges they face during talent recruitment as certain skills go missing. Not too surprisingly, problem solving, business innovation, adaptability and creativity have been cited as key skills missing. Leaders though must step in to help their existing team members in rectifying this gap. First of all, if one borrows from Hermann International’s Whole Brain model, leaders need to understand the sweet spot of team members where their thinking abilities are maximized. For example, if the employee is numbers driven, then he/she ought to be analytical. Similarly, an organized, task-driven personality can be expected to be practical, so to further improve the thinking ability, the leader may simply take a step back to allow the creative juices to do their work. The reasons for the thinking gaps ought then to get uncovered. The thinking too must evolve with the passage of time and changes in the business scenario. The greatest resistance to this change will be at times of productivity pressures. But well planned agility can ensure this transformation is smoothest.

Source:https://www.strategy-business.com/blog/How-Leaders-Can-Improve-Their-Thinking-Agility?gko=5058d

Uploaded Date:27 February 2018