Leading in a VUCAD World!

    

All leaders have heard and used the concept of VUCA. VUCA of course stands for Volatile, Uncertain,vucad-digital-world Complex, and Ambiguous. For the past several decades, millions of leaders and people like me who deliver business leadership training have used VUCA as a primary concept to help leaders move from Volatility to Vision, Uncertainty to Unity, Complexity to Clarity, and Ambiguity to Alignment.

But as we start thinking about 2022 and beyond, it’s time to retire VUCA and move to a more current and modern concept. It was a nice run, and it has helped thousands of leaders become better leaders because of it. The new concept leaders are using is called VUCAD and in the new framework, the D stands for Digital.

On the surface, you are probably wondering, “what’s the big deal?” It’s just one letter and we’ve been digital for years.” My response is don’t underestimate the impact of digital and how it changes everything you’ve ever learned or thought about leadership.

How the D in VUCAD Changes Everything in Leadership

Based on research, focus groups, workshops, and deep conversations with leaders over the past few months, I’ve assembled 3 key learnings:

1) Trust forms the foundation of all relationships in a new digital world…

According to the latest data from Kastle, more than 62% of people who used to work in an office environment are still working remotely. Think back to your 2016 self and ask yourself and answer honestly why you wouldn’t have your teams of people working remotely and you would most likely answer the question with an answer that had something to do with a lack of trusting them to work and get the work done. In the new reality of our digital world, every leader must be able to trust the people they work with with absolute certainty, or else the business falls apart.

As a result, building, earning, and managing trust becomes one of the most important skills leaders and team members have in this new reality. People who have bad reputations and aren’t trustworthy will fail miserably in this VUCAD world.

 2) The best Leaders will be able to break the silos in ways never imaginable before…

For decades, we have all come to accept that one of the harsh realities of leadership was working across and breaking the silos. The new digital world creates opportunities to break the silos because guess what? The silos have physically been eliminated because you can literally transport into someone’s workspace easily and with great trust and collaboration. We all have incredible collaboration tools and the ability to share, communicate, be creative, and lead effectively with accelerated efficiencies across the organization. It’s up to leaders to take advantage of the opportunities or fail.

3) There will be more work, but it will be easier to prioritize…

As we all deal with the realities of burnout and being overworked, there is a refreshing light at the end of 2021 as we enter 2022. We now know that if we wanted to, we could work 24 hours a day and still not get everything done. That won’t change. But thanks to many digital technologies and tools, we have a better line of sight into how much work we have and where that work lives. Once you know that, it is easier to prioritize your work and communicate your progress and workflow. Tools like Monday.com give you the opportunity to create workflow boards that integrate with other tools so you can see and prioritize key projects and of course your people resources.

There are many other elements beyond these three including leading remote teams, establishing better and more collaborative standards and procedures, and better leadership of the supply chain.

In summary, if you take 10 minutes every day to read the business news and understand the global dynamics of the changes around us you will realize that it is a truly VUCAD world and you should utilize these three tips to build better business acumen skills and make better business decisions.

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Robert Brodo

About The Author

Robert Brodo is co-founder of Advantexe. He has more than 20 years of training and business simulation experience.