Ryan, I have been also thinking about Jack Ma’s sequence of leadership, in which he recommends that by the time you are 50-60 yrs old, you should be following the younger people (Ma, 2016). In your post, in recommending innovation, you said “my advice to this company is that they would continue to listen to the younger and newer voices around them and to continue to innovate as they have successfully done to this point” (Morrow, 2018). I think that with the speed with which things are changing, we would be very remiss if we did not pay heed to the younger generation and use the power of their ideas and voices to innovate in our organizations.
Organizations need to be constantly thinking forward, seeing trends, and changing ahead of time to meet the challenges. It’s the younger people who are on the cusp of these changes.
Leaders need to not only have these younger voices advising them of the changes that are afoot, but they also need to apply certain strategies to enable those within their organizations to change. It isn’t just the leader who needs to be innovative – all people in an organization need to be envisioned for a change. George Couros (2015), emphasizes that when looking at innovation, we need to remember that the “whole is made up of the individuals” (pg. 74). But it doesn’t stop with empowering individuals. When empowered individuals share their ideas with one another, ask questions, and think critically, then individual good ideas become the best ideas (pg. 113).
When looking at a large scale innovation, leaders need to apply elements of adaptive change. They need to mobilize their people, motivate them to embrace new things, organize structural change, and orient and focus their attention on the new goal, and fresh vision (Heifetz 1994, as cited in Northouse, 2019, Pg. 258). Jack Ma seems like the leader who does this.
References:
Couros, G. (2015). The innovators mindset; Empower learning, unleash talent, and lead a culture of creativity. San Diego, CA. Dave Burgess Consulting.
Ma, Jack. [E-Learning]. (2016, June 23). Keys to Success from Jack Ma [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WjHZ5wLe6w.
Morrow, R. (2018, November 25). Unit 9 Learning Activity 2. [web blog comment]. Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/principalmorrow/2018/11/25/unit-9-learning-activity-2/
Northouse, P. G. (2019). Leadership: Theory and practice. Eighth Edition. Thousand Oaks, CA. Sage Publications.