Henrik Von Scheel: Future of work requires changes in leadership

HENRIK Von Scheel, the futurist who originated the term "fourth industrial revolution," said the future of work will be surrounded by the changing organisational structure of businesses and how they operate.

Von Scheel made the statement while speaking to business leaders at Arthur Lok Jack's Distinguished Leadership and Innovation Conference at the Hyatt Regency, Port of Spain on April 24.

“It is changing how you interact with each other, it is changing how you lead and your understanding of how to make strategies,” he said.

Von Scheel, in his presentation, showed a diagram of an organisational structure with the executive at the top, management in the middle and operators at the bottom.

He said it is somewhere between the management and the executive level that failures happen in projects. He said this structure means managers are little more than portfolio managers.

Von Scheel said in the future, management roles will be treated more like project managers, because the future of work will be based on project management.

“That is where you have all the knowledge about profit and loss, that is where you know the activities and everything within that,” he said.

He suggested future organisational structures will also benefit from rotating managers from department to department, because it would give a difference of perspective as the leaders change.

“Even if you are not a CFO, we want you to take that role for three months and be coached. Why? Because you taking that role will bring a new view to it,” he said. “You will be coached, but you will align as a team, not as a silo, on the condition of the company of how to execute. If you have an idea about this business area, you will know because you have been working there – you know the challenges.”

Von Scheel added that companies should not be afraid of failed strategies, as they are part of the process of developing successful ones.

“If you don’t do a failed strategy, you haven’t done a strategy,” he said. “I have tried more strategies that have failed than those that have succeeded.”

He also said it would be necessary to unlock the potential of each person in an organisation, as he believes the core capability of any organisation is in its people.

“Each of you has the potential, and to enable that potential is learning how to learn, unlearn and relearn.”