Thinking the Unthinkable

THINKING THE UNTHINKABLE; A NEW IMPERATIVE FOR LEADERSHIP IN THE DIGITAL AGE
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The emerging picture is both scary and of great concern. Remarkably, there remains a
deep reluctance, or what might be called ‘executive myopia’, to see and contemplate
even the possibility that ‘unthinkables’ might happen, let alone how to handle them. Yet
a majority of interviewees agreed that something of seismic scale and significance now
challenges many assumptions that leaders traditionally make about their abilities to spot,
identify and handle unexpected, non-normative events. Leadership has not necessarily
failed when judged by the qualities and skills that qualified it for the top. Instead the
world has moved on dramatically.
The rate and scale of change is much faster than most are even prepared to concede or
respond to. At the highest board and C-suite levels, executives and their public service
equivalents confess to often being overwhelmed. Nine key words and phrases are
identified which summarise the reasons for the new executive vulnerabilities. But by and
large, mind-sets, behaviour and systems are currently not yet adequately calibrated for
the new reality. Time is at such a premium that the pressing need to think, reflect and
contemplate in the ways required by the new ‘unthinkables’ is largely marginalised. This
is because of the intensity of unexpected, non-normative global developments for which
there seemed to be no advance alerts or signs.
Or were there signs?
This study heard that growing evidence for what were claimed to be ‘unthinkables’ did
often exist. But often blind eyes were turned, either because of a lack of will to believe
the signs, or an active preference to deny and then not to engage. While the phrase,
“Thinking the Unthinkable”, has an attractive rhetorical symmetry, a more appropriate
and accurate phrase might in many cases therefore be “Thinking the Unpalatable”.
In what is also fast becoming a new disruptive age of digital public empowerment, big
data and metadata, leadership finds it hard to recognise these failings, let alone find
answers and solutions. These challenges centre on the appropriateness and configuration
of management systems, plus the human capacity of those at the highest levels to
both cope with, and respond to, ‘unthinkables’. This is because most organisations are
increasingly afflicted by a ‘frozen middle’ that ‘lacks muscle’ and has little scope to
risk addressing the scale of the ‘wicked problems’ and ‘strategic gap’. But these are not
executive frailties that the vast majority want to readily admit to publicly. This creates
the cognitive dissonance that makes identifying ‘unthinkables’, then taking action to
prevent or pre-empt them even more problematic and unlikely.
With good reason, questions are being asked about why executive expertise within
institutions and corporates no longer seems able to provide its leaders with reliable
and comprehensive horizon scanning that will prevent the surprise or shock from
‘unthinkables’. Business leaders outlined the steps they are now taking to make their
business more strategic and resilient. The enlightened among them realise it requires new
energies and risk taking well outside existing comfort zones. They look with concern at
the price paid by some of their peers who have been publically exposed for failure.
The core leadership challenge is how to lead a company and government departments
through the speed and nature of fundamental change that threatens the very conformity
which has allowed the current leadership cohort to qualify for the top. Yet it is that same
conformity which blocks the kind of systemic and behavioural changes detailed for
consideration in the final section of this report. For the moment they remain untested
thoughts with a certain random quality and no stress testing. They have not yet been
assessed for whether they have a chance to achieve the level of success required to
re-equip leadership for what is obviously needed so smartly and rapidly. That will require
another stage of work.