Global Trends Affecting the Leadership Today

I was listening online to some teaching by Dr Rick Sessoms and he made some excellent points about some of the global trends affecting leadership and the way we do leadership today.

The trends he mentioned in our world in this lecture were the following:

1. Rising cynicism.
2. Shifting power.
3. Changing contracts

We live in a global culture of rising cynicism. He mentions a bumper sticker in the USA he has seen which reflects the attitude to politicians. “Don’t vote – it will only encourage them”.

We hear plenty about fallen and apostate Christian leaders. So clergy are not as trusted and honored these days. We have so much information at our fingertips (which is part of the second point) that we can easily get jaded and distrustful of everything and everyone. So to win confidence as a leader is more difficult today.

We live in a climate of shifting power. Today anyone can learn almost anything online. You can find out about someone while they are lecturing you. At the shops, you can google to see how much other stores are paying. You can listen to any sermons you want to – not only what your pastor approves of.

Technology is flattening the power structures of this world, getting rid of a lot of middle management. The old model of leadership “I’m the boss, so you have to do what I say” is faltering.

Loyalty is not enouraged in our society much because of changing contracts. Permanent employment and the concept of being committed for life to an organisation is declining, more and more work relationships are set up on a contracting basis.

Employees or contractors go for the highest bidder in most cases, and employers look for the best skilled person and will fairly readily dump them if their skillset is no longer as relevant. There is little job security.

I’m looking forward to listening more to Dr Rick as he begins in his series to speak about how Christ-centred leadership addresses all these concerns.