Leadership in a Flattened World

What is leadership in an age of unprecedented connectedness? When information is as accessible as the iPhone in your back pocket? When the world no longer needs data brokers, when the word “authority” inspires only suspicion and revolt, and when business, political, and religious icons are deconstructed at the click of a mouse button – what does it really mean to be in charge of anything?

Nothing. Because, in the new and increasingly flattened world, being in charge is an illusion. Being in charge only worked (and marginally so) in a world of slow change; in a predictable universe where information (and thus, power) is ensconced in the hands of a few. But that world is gone. With the rise of the individual (the power of one) and the rise of the tribe (the power of one connected), all bets are off. From the grassroots morph of groups like Al Qaeda to fragmenting retail markets to the small enterprise explosion in India and China, we see the old world of “big and powerful” unraveling.

Still, we hang on to our illusions. We retreat into the old story: leadership as domination and control. We try to deny that human beings are simply wired to push back. And now, we have an unprecedented ability to do so. Now, eighty-year old Uncle Harold can post his very own book review on Amazon.com. Twelve-year-old Jessica can organize a local rally for her favorite presidential candidate. It’s a YouTube, FaceBook, blogging world. We have broken the anonymity barrier. I speak. Therefore, I exist.

But the new world is more than just about push-back. It’s about connection. Yes, we may still crave cocoon time, but the Starbucks “third place” concept – whether real or virtual - has literally revived what it is to have a public life. We’re talking to each other more than ever before. It may not all be mature, healthy exchange, but the volume of dialogue says something: at our deepest levels, we want to know and be known. We want to put a stamp on life, to be noticed, to make a difference.

In summary, our expectation of influence is at an all-time high. Whether at work, in school, online, on our IPODs, or at the Home Depot do-it-yourself design center, we want our stories, our passions, preferences, and opinions to matter. And the most successful companies and innovations of the past fifteen years have figured this out. Creating interactive, personalized experiences for their customers is primary. But valuing each person’s significance and pressing for engagement doesn’t stop with the marketplace. Cutting-edge companies take participation to new levels within their organizational structures as well. Reason? When employees are released from bureaucracy to actually create, profits increase. Leadership theorist Margaret Wheatley agrees.

“There is a clear correlation between participation and productivity. In fact, productivity gains in truly self-managed work environments are at minimum 35 percent higher than in traditionally managed organizations.” 

Why the gains? Again, people want to have their opinions heard. They want to push back on company practices without having to fear that their job is at stake. And they want to belong – to know their co-horts care what is going on in their lives as well as their minds. Self-managed teams make for a better, more connective work environment, and in turn, more productive workers. And finally, the freedom to collaborate gives a big pay-off in the innovation department: on the whole, people seem to make better decisions together than apart. According to James James Surowiecki, author of The Wisdom of Crowds, they are collectively “more intelligent.”

Significance, influence, interaction, collective intelligence – all of these values describe an essential shift from passivity to reflexivity. We are no longer content to travel in lock-step fashion through life like faceless, isolated units performing our one little job in an assembly line. It is a new day. We want to help solve the problems of the world.

Inside the church, however, it’s a different story. Despite all our posturing about cultural relevance and our haranguing about the average church-goer’s lack of engagement, we continue to vision, staff, and build for passivity. In the warp and woof of change, we adopt yet another campaign. Another trendy look. A new slogan. New staff. We produce sound-bites that make it look like we’re listening, collaborating, releasing, but we’re not. It’s a top-down, in-charge world, and the people in the pews increasingly feel like pawns to our latest whim.

Leaders, we can do better. If we really want to see God’s work explode, let’s release our strangle-hold on ministry. Let’s be the leaders we were meant to be, not power-mongers and megalomaniacs, but catalysts, guides, midwives, and ship-rudders. Let’s stop trying to convince people we are open, adaptive, and permission giving, and really become all those things - leaders who release people to be the best they can be for God’s kingdom. 

In our current context of radical engagement, we have an incredible opportunity to change how we lead. Make the change. A new world awaits.