HR practitioners worldwide express the need to train people more in soft skills development. Our human resource department professionals know that this century is more complex than in the past when leadership was easy.
Within the backdrop of industrial and manufacturing setup, leadership was top-down. The manufacturing of gadgets did not require much thinking. What was expected was speed and efficiency. Bosses can hire and fire at will, and when their good people leave, their assets remain with them. Machines, factories, materials, etc., remained with the owners. Today, in an era of knowledge workers, when good people go, they bring the assets to competitors. Assets today primarily refer to the people’s knowledge, skills, competence, a network of connections, etc.
Today’s effective leaders need to be updated and upgraded in their leadership skills because they must understand the changing times and demographics. Many bosses, especially the more tenured and senior ones, look at the young as a bunch of “entitled,” “impatient,” and “arrogant” people who need to earn their stripes.
The younger ones cannot understand why their bosses behave the way they do. And worst, the promoted young do not know how to lead their teams and thus, drive their people away. All these would have been comedic except that this disconnect leads to attrition and turns out to be costly for the business.
Leaders today need to have cognitive intelligence. This is what is reflected on the leader’s CV or resume. You know – all those degrees, certifications, and alphabets attached to the last name of the leaders. But cognitive intelligence alone does not make them effective leaders today. They also need to have emotional, social, and moral intelligence. Many of these “intelligences” mentioned you can hardly find in business schools and courses – much less in the old “leadership framework” training programs that have been around for years that mainly cater to the needs of the manufacturing-industrial era.
Today’s leaders are not just book-smart (cognitive); they must be street-smart (entrepreneurial); and they have to be heart-smart (humane and sensitive). And why is this so? Here are the realities. When people join our organization in general, they are:
1. More educated
Young adults today are better educated than their grandparents. Each new generation is equipped with more education than the prior generation. The leadership style in the 1950s could be more top-down because fewer people were educated and were willing to be told what to do.
2. More exposed
People joining our teams are exposed to more content and realities than previous generations. A teenager with a smartphone is exposed to at least 10,000 messages a day. And these messages come in the form of posts, ads, TikTok’s, podcasts, TV shows, emails, YouTube videos, songs, and conversations in person. And because they have seen more, they assume they know more, and in fairness, they frequently do. Add the orientation of a WOKE generation, political correctness, and all these foster cynicism and skepticism, making them difficult to lead.
3. More expectation
People today bring increased expectations of what they will experience at work. Some of these expectations are legit, while many are unrealistic and naive. Many young “motivational speakers” say: “The objective of life is to be happy! If you are not happy in your job, then quit.” And many do.
4. More entitlement
Expectations and entitlement are not twins, but are second cousins, according to author Tim Elmore. Entitlement is all about feeling we deserve something, a perk or a better experience than average. Expectation’s concern what we presume will happen. One is more about emotions; the other is more about thoughts. Both can lead to powerful assumptions that leaders must deal with.
5. More emotions
What is ironic is that the better educated and informed young generation should promote rationality and logic, but they turn out to be highly emotional and anxious. There is a rise in emotional outbursts, outrage, and inability to manage their emotions. Many lack the ability for critical thinking, but go out on a hunting spree for confirmation bias. There seems to be more reacting and reflecting, such that a conflict with their bosses immediately trigger the emotions and drive them to quit and resign.
We need socially and emotionally intelligent leaders who can manage tensions and engage with a very different breed of people in the workplace today. We need wise leaders who are willing to learn and develop their leadership skills and make them effective and efficient in a world filled with uncertainties, yet bursting with opportunities.
Our HR friends are right all this time.
(Francis Kong will run his Level Up Leadership 2.0 Master Class Online in April 2022. For inquiries and reservations, contact April at +63928-559-1798 or and for more information, visit www.levelupleadership.ph)