It’s been a busy couple of weeks in my inbox so I was spoilt for choice while selecting the most useful articles for founders who are scaling their businesses. I settled on these three:
A fresh series of articles from Dr Richard Claydon that challenges many of the superficial notions of what leadership now means. As Richard puts it “maybe you’ve simply stopped believing that leadership – as currently taught, measured, and mythologized – is enough for the complexity you now face.”
My take: I’ve found this series fascinating. Richard has taken his deeply researched academic thinking and turned it into accessible and thought provoking articles. His core idea – that most of what passes as leadership thinking ignores the complexity of the context where it takes place – really resonates for me.
2. Dissent, Not Consensus, Is the Shorter but Steeper Path
Stowe Boyd looks at the importance of dissent in decision-making, arguing that group decision-making can fall into several bias-related traps that affect the quality of decisions that emerge.
My take: Dissent is usually seen as a negative to be minimised or pushed through, but this is a good explanation of why dissent can be valuable in the messy scale-up journey as choices are made.
The FLUX Review explains how leadership changes in more senior roles through the lenses of authority and influence. As roles get more senior there’s a trade-off between width of authority and depth of influence that people often forget.
My take: I do a lot of organisational design work with founders, helping them work out the right leadership structure as their businesses grow. This is a helpful explanation of the problems that can emerge from the leadership roles we create and how those can be mitigated.
That’s your lot for this week. Have a good one.
best,
-sw
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