Thinking the Unthinkable

THINKING THE UNTHINKABLE; A NEW IMPERATIVE FOR LEADERSHIP IN THE DIGITAL AGE
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SCOPING THE NEW
NORMATIVE: IS IT
EVEN POSSIBLE?
The ‘unthinkable’ events since 2014 must be regarded as harbingers of the kind of
‘dramatic shifts’ and ‘volatility’ that must be expected and prepared for in the months
and years to come.
To assume otherwise risks accusations of negligence and complacency. In business,
leaders of companies at the cutting edge of technology are already particularly
vulnerable. This is because there is a “Bigger attack surface, more opportunity to do you
harm” as a leading cyber-security specialist put it. But in so many ways, “You ain’t seen
nothing yet” because of the exponential speed of developments in Big Data, Artificial
Intelligence, 3-D printing, cyber vulnerabilities and demographic trends. This is the new
normative. Dramatic changes which might have been assumed to take place over 20
years, could now easily happen in 20 months, 20 weeks or perhaps even 20 days.
“We’re in that type of timeframe with technology moving 3 to 5 times faster than
management”, said a top level management consultant. That will further multiply the
future pressures from ‘unthinkables’ and ‘unpalatables’ in what currently remain unknown
and unchartable directions.
This will be a major stretch. In the view of one senior Chair: “One of the big concerns
for all companies in thinking the unthinkable is that the people around the table,
however the mix is put together, are typically of a certain age. I mean there’s a span.
But they’re typically somewhere from 50 onwards. And most of those people have no
real fundamental understanding of the cyber risk. They have it from reading things and
listening to people speak but they have no fundamental understanding”. Some impacts
can be predicted now. But much of the revolutionary change is likely to be ever more
unpredictable for the same reasons that the ‘unthinkables’ since the start of 2014 have
unhinged normative executive assumptions. Overall, “We need, I think – government and
companies alike – to spend a lot more on these predictive capabilities than has been the
case so far”, was the firm view of one former senior public servant who has more recently
worked for a major global corporate.
It is similar in the parallel world of government. Since the start of 2014, the impact of the
simultaneous ongoing shifting tectonic plates across Eastern Europe and the Middle East
(both by their broadest definitions), plus the new and massive migration threat globally,
must be viewed with both pessimism and the clearest possible analytical eyes. Optimism
can have no place. It must be assumed that the continuing process of upheaval could
over time be on the same systemic and disruptive scale as what led eventually to the
1648 Peace of Westphalia, or the French and American Revolutions.
Defining the likely scale and nature of the challenge ahead – however apocalyptic
potentially – and the searching questions that could arise, should not be palmed-off as a
pastime for the ‘awkward squad’. It is a logical and relatively straightforward requirement.
But specifying practical options to resolve them is far more problematic. “Yes, clearly the
phenomenon exists”, said a prominent German official. “I am at a loss explaining how we
could deal with it more efficiently. It’s not easy to develop the recipe”.
The ultimate leadership responsibility can only remain at the top. But at that level
of responsibility there continues to be much evidence of ongoing myopia. “Are these
rational decisions based on really deep understanding of the risk and making the
decisions? I don’t think so. I think it’s actually people going, ‘this hasn’t to do with me,
this hasn’t to do with me, shove it over there’”. Such leadership attitudes have to be
regarded as doom laden. The priority for addressing ‘unthinkables’ or ‘unpalatables’ must
now be unambiguously viewed as a formidable, intimidating new direct responsibility for
leadership, from whichever generation it emerges.