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And what if the role of leaders was—also—to simplify managers’ work in order to free up some of their time? Good middle managers can make all the difference, not only in ensuring the proper execution of strategy, but also in developing the teams and retaining talents. But do managers truly have the time and availability to devote themselves fully to these missions?

For example, in one healthcare company, middle managers had to handle an average of 300 requests from the head office and senior management every week. That much less attention available to support employee development! Managers' schedules were overloaded with reporting, supervisory committees and administrative tasks of every kind. The company initiated a process of pruning and sorting, starting from the managers' perspective and asking them what was really important in their eyes to allow them to accomplish their missions.

A rethinking process from which any organization would benefit from inspiring itself, to avoid the inflation of demands on managers and help them focus on what truly provides value to the organization.

Source: Are middle managers your next ace in the hole?, Emily Field, Bryan Hancock, The McKinsey Podcast, August 2023.

How can you best prepare to become a leader in a context marked by ever-increasing uncertainty and complexity? That was the question Roselinde Torres, a leadership expert and consultant for the Boston Consulting Group, asked herself. To answer it, she studied the leadership programs of numerous organizations and tracked the career paths of individuals who succeeded or failed as they took on leadership roles. According to her, a central characteristic that sets those who succeed apart is the cultivation of a highly diversified network. This enables them to develop the ability to interact with a wide variety of profiles, but also to factor different perspectives into their decision-making.

The idea that it is important for a leader to cultivate their networks is nothing new. But it is really the notion of diversification that is central here. You surely have affinity networks in which you recognize yourself and feel at ease. But do you reach beyond them? Are you training yourself sufficiently in developing relationships with people who do not share the same points of view as you, the same frames of reference, the same perceptions? Regularly reviewing your networks is an essential reflex to turn them into a strategic asset. 

Source: What it takes to be a great leader, Roselinde Torres, TED@BCG San Francisco, February 2014.

Legendary basketball coach John Wooden is quoted as having once said: “Never mistake activity for achievement.” And yet, within our companies, a kind of cult of hyperactivity often exists. It is considered good form to show that you are always busy, even overwhelmed. Is this not a sign of being indispensable, at the heart of critical projects? Of course, your effective workload has an incompressible impact on your schedule. But it is also common to measure a person’s level of commitment and contribution by how busy they appear to be.

This over-valuation of hyperactivity has high individual and collective costs. Professional burnout syndrome, bureaucratic overload, diminished creativity…: the consequences of this frenzy are numerous. So, what if you rehabilitated the value of downtime or less directly productive moments? Here are some actions you can initiate to get the ball rolling:

– Create slots of time within the team’s agenda during which meetings are forbidden.

– As a manager, dare to take breaks conspicuously.

– Encourage your team members to do the same and to take advantage of breaks to truly disconnect—for instance by stepping outside for some fresh air.

Source: Beware a Culture of Busyness, Adam Waytz, Harvard Business Review, March-April 2023.

Putting an end to projects or cutting loose from historical activities is always difficult. And yet it is a practice that distinguishes companies that are lastingly over-performing. The logic is rather intuitive: perpetuating dead-end projects only disperses resources and undermines the company's ability to invest in more solid avenues. Nonetheless, in practice, many biases make this process difficult. Consulting firm PwC has identified four practices that can help make the divestment exercise more natural and more effective:

- Implementing standardized and regular portfolio evaluations. The cadence is important to making this a habit.

- Carrying out an in-depth review of each project in the portfolio, including the analyses of historical financial data, but also of extra-financial information and of the current and future competitive environment. Many companies stop with the first of these analyses.

- Involving the board of directors in these assessments. The study shows a significant positive impact of this involvement on the likelihood of companies considering divestments. The involvement of the board also speeds up the implementation process.

- Working on reinvestment plans in parallel. Identifying other avenues to be pursued once existing projects are closed helps to counter the status quo bias, by making the opportunity cost visible.

Source:  The power of portfolio renewal and the value in divestitures, PwC US, March 2023.

Currently, most companies are pondering how they can best take advantage of AI at their own scale. Applications and experiments are thus flourishing, with varying degrees of success. Very often, the frustrations are commensurate with the hopes. And with good reason: AI, however "intelligent" it may be, can ultimately only do one thing—work from the data we provide it with. To capitalize on it, we therefore need centralized data of sufficient quality and quantity, and derived from a wide range of sources. In many organizations, however, this data is scattered among various business functions, each of which has its own systems.

So, before considering sophisticated generative AI set-ups, it is useful to carry out a quick diagnosis of your organization. Is tacit knowledge sufficiently formalized? Is it centralized? Are data collection and processing methods sufficiently standardized? Given the nature and quantity of the data collected, is there a risk of triggering biased responses from your AI system? Would you benefit from access to additional sources? This upstream work is essential to ensuring the quality of the AI's responses and maximizing its potential to help decision-making.

Source:  Harnessing AI to accelerate digital transformation, The Choice by ESCP, July 2023.