Leaders Make the Future

“Leaders Make the Future: Ten New Leadership Skills for an Uncertain World” by Bob Johansen.

We are in a time of disruptive leadership change. In a VUCA world – one characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity – traditional leadership skills won’t be enough, noted futurist Bob Johansen argues. Drawing on the latest ten-year forecast from the Institute for the Future – the only futures think tank ever to outlive its forecasts – this powerful book explores the external forces that are shaking the foundations of leadership and unveils ten critical new skills that will be required in the future, skills that you can learn.

In this second edition Johansen is joined by the prestigious Center for Creative Leadership. CCL’s contributions help readers understand the new leadership skills by linking them to existing skills, and they provide analytics and exercises to help readers develop them. This edition has been updated throughout, with a new ten-year forecast and new examples, and incorporates the lessons Johansen has leaned about applying the new leadership skills in the three years since the first edition appeared. In addition, Johansen deals with two new forces that are shaping the future. The first is the “digital natives,” or people 15 years and younger who have grown up in a completely digital world. The second is cloud-based computing, which will enable new forms of connection, collaboration and commerce and will greatly facilitate reciprocity-based innovation – giving away to get more – which Johansen sees as the biggest innovation opportunity in history.