Leadership - What Really Matters: A Handbook on Systemic Leadership (Management for Professionals)

Chapter 5

Conclusion or: Where the Road Is Leading

No future can make up for what you have missed in the present.

Albert Schweitzer

As I have explained several times, in my opinion leadership means creating a world
that others are glad to be part of. I am convinced that in the future the “soft” factors
of leadership will continue to grow in importance because of their immense impact
on companies’ economic success. If the change in the management development
and leadership in companies’ everyday work is effective – we know that course
corrections of large ships always take considerable time and space, so for large
corporations it will be visible only after a few years – then there will be a different
understanding of leadership than today. And due to increasing internationalization
and digitalization, Germany is experiencing a salutary push that will eliminate the
last vestiges of the “imperial” tradition of leadership – towards networking, trust
and emotional intelligence.
Essential management tools will always belong to the equipment of a good
leader, and we must work to improve these tools further and to adapt them to new
requirements. Their application should be taught not only in theory but be based on
learning by doing – much more than it is today – and should not begin (or end) at the
executive level, where any mistake can have disastrous consequences for the entire
organization, precluding long-term learning. To this extent, I agree with Malik
concerning his complaint about the lack of practical training of leaders and I place
my hopes in the future.
But good training is not enough. Choosing future managers should no longer
primarily be based on their IQ but also their EQ. Authenticity will be more
important than a particular type of leader, and self-management and relationship
management skills must become more important than a stack of business school
degrees. Yet the fact that “soft” factors are gaining credence does not mean a
relapse into a cuddly “we all love each other” mentality. When I provocatively
claim that leading also means being able to love, I am talking about hard work. This
involves truly accepting yourself and the people around you and promoting their
strengths in order to enable them to take on personal responsibility and self-

D.F. Pinnow,Leadership - What Really Matters, Management for Professionals,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-20247-6_5,#Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2011

237