New leadership models for the VUCA world. Five leadership approaches to cope with uncertainty (PDF)

Seminar paper from the year 2017 in the subject Business economics - Business Management, Corporate Governance, grade: 1,3, University of applied sciences, Cologne, course: Soft skills & Leadership Qualities, language: English, abstract: This paper examines new leadership models for the VUCA world. Nowadays, companies have to deal with unknown competition from everywhere around the world. This has changed business worlds into worlds of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity (VUCA).

The study begins by investigating the aforementioned VUCA attributes within micro- and macro-economic business environments. Following, five models for leadership in the VUCA world are described. Afterwards, it focuses on finding similarities between the previously described models. As a result, five important areas are defined that leaders have to focus on in order to stay competitive in the VUCA world. These areas are: Communication, analysis, flexibility, team orientation and vision.

Over the last three decades, globalization and progressive digitization drastically improved living and working conditions of many human beings around the world. People have gained permanent access to knowledge over the internet, customers can order products worldwide and former language barriers were dissolved by the introduction of software for instant language translations.

For many businesses, these achievements came with several side effects. For decades, organizations were able to create reliable mid- and long-term strategic corporate plans, as companies were aware of their (local) competition and upcoming product innovations. In order to remain successful in the new VUCA world, leaders have to adapt their leadership skills and behaviors to the new conditions.