New Types of Leaders Are Taking Center Stage

I snapped this on my recent trip to Niagra Falls in April 2023.

Recognizing and Training Emerging Leaders for a New World

The pandemic introduced into the mainstream new ways of working together previously utilized by only a small percentage of the workforce. Working remotely, collaboratively, and across different continents and organizations is now the norm for many. This current work model requires a new set of skills and work habits to overcome current challenges of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity, which I wrote about in a previous post—The Key to Thriving in a VUCA World. These new skills include cultural awareness, flexibility, creating healthier and more effective work/life boundaries, and an openness to lean into the unknown.

Letting Go into the Flow of Change

Embracing these new skills involves a “letting go” of old work patterns, habits, and structures including organizational traditions normalized during the corporate era such as fixed work times, predictable tasks, inflexible deadlines, and the dictation of specific actions. Today’s working conditions are vastly different and require embracing complexity, uncertainty, and working in emergence. Detailed plans and deliberate strategies have given way to more general pathways urging workers to adapt, let go, and follow the flow of change.

The Rise of New Types of Leadership During the Pandemic

An organic organizational approach, emergent leadership is based on leaders being identified by those around them rather than selected by a corporate hierarchy. The pandemic’s enormous waves of change created a vital need and welcome opportunity for new types of leaders and management models. Two of these emerging leadership types include social leaders and change agents.

Social Leaders – Building Trust

During the pandemic, when all sense of normalcy went out the window, many people turned to social leaders for support, a listening ear, stability, help, and more. Social leaders take on a variety of forms including nurses, neighbors, teachers, coaches, front-line workers, parents—they are your everyday people.

Gifts: Within organizations, social leaders help an organization to thrive by connecting the power of the community to the daily challenges of work. The foundation of social leadership is humility, fairness, kindness, and above all trust. But it is no soft form of power—it is an earned power, and because of that it carries great weight.
Challenges: By nature, social leaders are very caring and sensitive human beings who often overextend themselves in the name of helping and being of service to others. They are at a substantial risk of burnout, compassion fatigue, and taking on the worries, burdens, and problems of those they care for. Finding sustainable ways to share their care and gifts with others that are also supportive of their own health and well-being is key for social leaders to thrive in their roles.

Change Agents – Sowing the Seeds of Change

Change agents are adept at planting seeds and creating fertile ground for change. Traditionally, the workplace hasn’t recognized them as leaders but as influencers of groups through their suggestions, conversations, and ideas.

Gifts: More than ever, the role of a change agent has never been more important and its absence more costly. Five key qualities of change agents are: flexibility, diversified knowledge, prioritization, accountability and responsibility, and effective listening skills.
Challenges: Sometimes it is necessary for a change agent to move from an influencer role to more of a direct leadership role to implement their vision. This can create a lot of internal resistance and hesitancy for a variety of reasons including concern of becoming assimilated into the very system they are trying to change; dealing with bureaucracy, politics, and administrative work; concern over becoming distanced from the very people they wish to support with the change; and less maneuverability and ability to make change by being limited by position/role.

No Matter What Your Leadership Style Is, Do It with Heart!

Whether you are a social leader or change agent, learning to lead from the heart inspires others to feel that change is possible. It also encourages loyalty and builds powerful relationships built on kindness, caring and respect. Heart-centered leaders interact from a feeling state of peace, calmness, happiness, and gratitude.

Simply put, heart-centered leadership is based on love. When you love your team, they love you back! This way of leading (and being!) is contagious. When people feel that you not only have their best interests at heart but the best interests of everyone involved (even those you can’t see or don’t know), there is a natural trust that grows and expands. This creates a fertile ground for change that can organically lead to community, self-organizing, and innovation. Heart-centered leaders genuinely want what is best for the whole and naturally create collaborative environments where everyone can lead from their gifts and strengths. Learn more about heart-centered leadership training.

Tension Creates Transformational Opportunities

The tension created by individual, group, and organizational uncertainty provides a tremendous opportunity for transformation. When emerging leaders and change agents are willing to embody change, they inspire those around them. Through deep listening, sharing, and being in relational co-creative spaces with others on similar journeys but who hold different perspectives, the opportunity for healing, collective wisdom, and joint action can emerge.

Now that the pandemic’s immediate threat has subsided, organizations are pulling many emerging leaders back into the confines of traditional structures, which may be changing slower than conditions require. As a result, these types of leaders may feel frustrated and trapped yet bursting with energy and ideas to bring their vision into a world yearning for new ways of working together.

As a society we have everything we need to solve our global challenges. The question is do we have enough emerging leaders who can lead from the heart to co-create a new world?

To learn more about leading with heart, please get in touch!