Lideratge i tecnologia: nous models de creació de valor en l’era de la col-laboració.

This is an article included in the special monograph “ICTs, competitiveness, survival and opportunity”, published by the Official College of Industrial Engineers of Catalonia.

The article is in Catalan, as it was published:

Lideratge i tecnologia: nous models de creació de valor en l’era de la col-laboració

JOSÉ CABRERA

Estem vivint temps extraordinaris. Ens trobem en els inicis d’un nou paradigma que hem anomenat era de la col·laboració, i que es basa en la col·laboració massiva en xarxes obertes i globals. This paradigm offers new forms of value creation; it is a dir, gran opportunitats de creixement i innovació. But the previous arrival is a massive fort. The era of collaboration coexists with the traditional structures sorgides in the industrial era, and the col·lisió d’ambdós mons is inevitable. The global financial crisis is the clearest thing that something does not work, and that the principles of which our development model has become obsolete. The truth is that it is not possible to give a simple oversalt that is original to bankers sense. The crisis has been made clear that the models of growth of the pass have not served. They have allowed us to arrive at the current level of economic, social and technological development. But the model is exhausted. The organizations and institutions that have created, incloses the companies, do not work. They are rigid, opaques, lenses, misdeers and bureaucratics. They are not thought of per les persones. I, per descomptat, s’han mostrat incapable of adapting to the reptiles that are waiting in the future.

Davant dels nous reptes, the companies have to seriously rethink their business model, the value proposal in terms of products and services offered, and the forms that are related to their customers and suppliers. But the transformation has proven to be the most appropriate option for the face of crisis situations, and to profit from the enormous opportunities for the creation of value. Web 2.0 technologies are a way to address our responses. As the consulting firm Mackinsey assenyalava, they can generate an impact on the productivity of companies that is higher than that of ERP, CRM and SCM solutions. Això és així perquè les tecnologies 2.0 es dirigeixen a l’usuari final: són molt senzilles d’utilitzar i, per tanto, sànse des’involucre la pràctica totalitat dels treballadors, not only those who are part of the leadership pyramid. But it faces that the role of technology is phonemental, it is not necessary to force the most important part of the canvis to reside in people, in the ability to introduce significant innovations in leadership models, management processes and organizational structure. L’autèntic repte consisteix a crear orgitzacions àgils, capable of adapting to the canvis, i atreure el nou talent digital que les empreses necessiten per competir. Mitjançant les eines i aplicacions web 2.0, les petites i mitjanes empreses poden aprofitar les opportunitats obertes pels nous models de creació de valor basats in: A) The massive collaboration, which allows us to share our talent with that of millions of people located in the world’s world and that acts in the sociocultural field (creates new forms of talent, entertainment and collaboration) and economic (builds markets and organizations that are more efficient). B) The arrival of the organizations of the first generation of digital partners, the young people who have been born and created in the packaging of digital devices with the computer, the mobile or the video console. They are different from us. They approach technology and innovation in a natural way and have the talent that companies need to innovate. They dare and retain their talent by being a priority objective of the companies. C) Social networks, which allow you to create new forms of open and transparent communication between employees, administrators, and directly with customers. Events such as Twitter, Facebook, Tuenti, MySpace, etc., allow you to generate conversations around the company. It is not a matter of selling products but of building a brand, getting recommendations or, simply, being in the mind of users. D) Open innovation and market children. The real possibility of connecting the information and talent of millions of people allows them to participate in the creation of a “collective intelligence”. Practices with crowdsourcing show that this “collective intelligence” is one of the most powerful sources of innovation. From here they will sorgiran respostes per als reptes complexos als quals ens ens enfrontem. An altre of the most outstanding aspects is the ability that SMEs have to create personalized products and direct them to microsegments of the market that are not rendible. In other areas, technology has made the sale of limited quantities of products endendable.

In this way, we pass through the massa market to market children. E) Nous models organitzatius basats en xarxes globals i obertes. The experience of the OpenSource communities, creators of codes, shows that it is possible to build innovative products and based quality in organizational structures different from the traditional hierarchical model. These new communities bet on the horizontal structures, in which they share and contribute dynamically. People are jutja for the value they contribute to the organization.

It faces that the role of technology is phonamental, the most important part of the canvis resideix in the people and in the ability to introduce innovations in the leadership models, the management processes and the organizational structure.

If our model of belief is to be useful, it is evident that we can also redefine ourselves in our current model of leadership. To be able to redefine it, but it is not easy. The proof is that we continue to be obstinate to use these anachronic ines to respond to a time complete, a time marked by the change in action and in the presence of the most complex social structures. If there is something we can be sure of, it is that the responses will not come from the upper part of the organizational pyramids. The starting point must be, necessarily, an exercise of humanity. Hem d’assumir que, com a liders individuals, no tenim la capacitat per trobar les respostes que necessitem. Per fer front als reptes complexos als quals ara ens enfrontem, la resposta ha de ser col·lectiva. Avui, the leader’s paper consists, precisely, of exploring the new reality to identify those questions that allow us to anticipate the impact of the canvis on our organization. The leader must be able, moreover, to mobilize all the people of the organization to assume a collective responsibility that allows them to face the problems. We can say, therefore, that leadership 2.0 is the art of exploring the future by finding innovative solutions that allow our organizations to flourish in the new era. Such a thing has come to look for a new balance between the need to achieve effective organizations and the demand, each time more present, to build organizations that are truly centered on people. This new balance has to combine the priorities of the prices and the priorities of the people. We have to be able to coordinate the efforts of our people who are able to create bureaucratic, hierarchical and inflexible organizations. We must be able to control the results and maintain efficiency in sacrificing the creativity of people. In short, we have to find a new balance between the personal needs of freedom and autonomy and the needs of prediction and control of the organization. To achieve all these objectives, we have no more reason to introduce important changes in our organizations. Gary Hamel has a new balance in the free Leadership of the future:

“Our companies must not only be operationally effective, but they must also be agile and capable of responding to the changes that are alive. Leadership and innovation cannot be the patrimony of a few, but they must be a shared work for all.”

If we are preparing for the future, we cannot deixar de costat les noves generacions de jovenes: l’única manera d’atreure i retenir el nou talent digital passa per la creació d’organitzacions veritablement centrades en les persones. It is, in short, a matter of creating a new operational culture in which the new values of cooperation, participation, collaboration and transparency follow a reality, and do not end up becoming a mere rhetoric of management.