Old mindsets of control and management are floundering in this new world.
What role can women in leadership play in this economy, and what makes women best placed to deal with the new order?
Connections are doing more than accelerating the economy; they are changing the way the economy works and the way leaders lead their organisations.
The internet, more so than any other technology, is driving us from the information era into the connection economy. Information systems are necessary, but no longer sufficient to create a competitive advantage.
Something more is required: the human factor. Dare I say the female factor?
As women, we are best known for our ability to create authentic relationships, both in and outside business. The ability to create authentic relationships is a special ingredient, and necessary requirement in the connection economy.
Who you are matters most.
Prior to the connected age, little attention was paid to the collaborative relationships possible between individuals, teams, departments, business units and organisations.
One of the most precious commodities organisations have in being able to play in the connection economy is people.
The connection economy requires a fundamental shift from seeing people as numbers, to seeing them as people who all look at the world with different perspectives.
The leadership demands in a connection economy place emphasis on characteristics and skills such as intuition, empathy, and the ability to work with paradox, polarities and uncertainty.
This is a world where asking the right questions is more important than having the answers, where leaders will need to be learners, listeners, adapters, storytellers, nurturers and synthesisers.
So in this emerging connection economy, it is women who have the inside lane when it comes to leadership, and it is women who will thrive.
A study by Gur and Gur found that the typical female manages information, emotions, and relationships differently to the typical male.
Their study concludes that women are better placed and more comfortable with facilitating discussion and smoothing conflicts than men.
These findings suggest that because female managers typically display those virtues best, project team leadership will shift more and more to women.
Similarly, in her book The Female Advantage Sally Helgesen shows that organisations run by women do not take the form of the traditional hierarchical pyramid.
Instead, they more closely resemble a web where leaders reach out, not down, to form interrelating matrices built around a central purpose.
In her later book The Web of Inclusion Helgesen takes her spider web analogy further and gives the reader a glimpse of the post-industrial organisation which is fluid, technology driven, and based on creativity and relationships.
As an analogy, webs of inclusion perfectly mesh with the ever-changing demands of the information age, diversity, and strategic alliances. Women seem to function well in this environment.
Two of the most important factors propelling women into positions of corporate power are the two major forces that are shaping the economy itself.
These are rapid technological change and the shift to what is typically referred to as the horizontal corporation.
These changes will ultimately favour leaders who excel at influencing others, are team players and understand how to create the space for dialogue and thinking together for the good of the whole.
This requires a level of maturity in which you + me = let us work together. By listening, supporting, and encouraging people to differ, leaders ensure a constant dialogue over future directions and resolving the tensions between competing ideas.
These leaders have sensitivity to others and respect their ideas, feelings and emotions.
Interactive leadership is all about creating an emotional connection with people and is one of the reasons why women are finding their way into more and more leadership positions.
They have a greater tendency to create webs of inclusion and environments for open communication.
These skills may come more naturally to women, and they may be the most important ingredients for success in the 21st century as male-dominated organisations struggle to find a new touchstone to release the talent locked within their diverse workforce.
- Fin24
* Ngao Motsei is group executive strategic human resources of MMI Holdings. She is the latest guest columnist taking part in Fin24's
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