"What does leadership mean in disruptive change?" was a key theme of the 8th St. Gallen Trade Day. In the following, we would like to present some inputs on how executives from Migros, Karstadt, IKEA, A.T.U and VIU view the topic.
Digitisation does not represent a linear development, the current change is very difficult to control. Classical management models of the industrial age, no longer work. New terms are appearing: Leadership 4.0 or Digital Leadership, from one point of view or another, with one common fact: it is more than just a small adjustment in leadership, the teams should be led digitally.
That is why we have to rethink the question of the qualification of employees and managers, especially in the area of human resources: How do we create a way of thinking, a sustainable way of thinking? Is this Disruptive Thinking?
Sarah Kreienbühl, member of the Migros General Management defines leadership in disruptive change as "Recognising new opportunities in a changing environment and actively shaping them in terms of environment, strategy, organisation and people". This implies that employees become co-entrepreneurs, change is positively anchored in the company and innovative projects can be implemented quickly.
Marco Werner, Chief Digital Officer of Karstadt, sees a consistently high openness to digitization and employee-oriented communication as success factors for actively promoting disruption. To this end, Karstadt is currently building a networked marketplace with a planned total of more than 1 million target group-relevant products online in areas such as household, fashion and consumer electronics.
Simona Scarpaleggia, CEO of IKEA Switzerland, emphasises the relevance of approaching change proactively rather than reactively or even ignoring important developments completely. This requires employees to have access to relevant tools and information to proactively drive change in a secure environment with a certain level of fault tolerance.
As former CEO of A.T.U., Conrad and Berner Group, Jörn Werner, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of A.T.U., has actively shaped the digitization of retail on several occasions over the past 15 years and is convinced that the value proposition to the customer must always be at the center of attention. The goal of a company should be that employees can create and develop "start-ups within the company" without leaving the company. This requires decentralized decision-making processes in which employees can and should take responsibility for decisions on site.
Kilian Wagner, founder and CEO of VIU, sees mastering the challenge of "entrepreneurship vs. structure" as central to remaining innovative, but to consistently implementing what has been learned, now that VIU has grown from the founding team to 220 employees within a few years. I would summarize "Leadership in disruptive change" after this exciting event: To create and lead an organization in which employees are challenged and encouraged as change-ready, innovative and self-responsible "entrepreneurs within the company" in order to proactively shape the rapid disruption of trade.
