Essential Readings: Systematically enhancing the responsiveness with effective leadership skills in the context of a digital mindset

Today’s list of “Essential Readings” is spotlighting key recommendations for the “digital transformation” strategy. From this the recipe for success is in a systematic but iterative process of enhancing the responsiveness and risk taking of the organization with effective leadership skills where the digital mindset and the emptional intelligence is playing a key role:

Culture for a digital age
Citation: “In our experience, executives who wait for organizational cultures to change organically will move too slowly as digital penetration grows, blurs the boundaries between sectors, and boosts competitive intensity. […] So do the experiences of leading players such as BBVA, GE, and Nordstrom, which have shown what it looks like when companies support their digital strategies and investments with deliberate efforts to make their cultures more responsive to customers, more willing to take risks, and better connected across functions.”
Google Spent Years Studying Effective Bosses. Now They Teach New Managers These 6 Things
Citation: “Using Project Oxygen, an internal study that analyzed more than 10,000 manager impressions including performance reviews, surveys, and nominations for top-manager awards and recognition, Google identified six habits of highly effective managers. […] While these six attributes may seem basic, according to a New York Times article, the results are anything but. Google reported a statistically significant improvement in 75 percent of its underperforming managers after implementing the program.”
The six attributes are: 1. Mindset and values, 2. Emotional intelligence (EI), 3. Manager transition, 4. Coaching, 5. Feedback, 6. Decision making
Digital Transformation and the Leadership Quandary
Citation: “In short, digital transformation requires a new type of leader with a digital mindset that is broadly encompassing, fueled by growing network effects, and strategically turning over non-essential control to their network of change agents to drive the many hundreds, if not thousands of local microtransformations that will collectively result in a holistic and aligned overall digital transformation. It’s a more organic, pervasive, and sustainable way and, I believe, the only real way most digital transformation will ultimately happen.”
Minimum viable transformation
Citation: “The core principles of the minimum viable product—validated learning, rapid prototyping, frugal creativity—can help organizations limit the shortcomings of traditional transformation programs. Minimum viable transformations can reduce risk and increase speed, better enabling business model transformation at scale.”
Principles: 1. Learn how to learn, 2. Pick up speed, 3. Embrace constraints, 4. Have a hypothesis, 5. Start at the edge