“Culture is just a set of behaviors. This means that if you change people’s behaviors, you’re going to change the culture. So if you’re a startup and you’re trying to create a new culture, then a great way to do that is to set aside time to figure out the expected social behaviors and the social contracts that you want to have in your team or company.”
– Kian Gohar
The pandemic completely shifted the nature of how we work. The abrupt changes brought by the pandemic either destroyed companies or forced them to radically adapt. In this episode, Julian speaks with Kian Gohar about the leadership principles, culture changes, and new rules of work that are required to thrive in this new age.
❓ Who is Kian?
Kian Gohar inspires the world’s leading organizations to harness innovation and moonshots to solve complex problems.
💥 Kian is the co-author of “Competing in the New World of Work” with Keith Ferrazzi, which was published just two days ago on February 15th by HBR. The book highlights the future of work by providing research-based insights and best practices for leading change in the ever-evolving post-pandemic world of work. Kian, Keith, and their team interviewed over 2000 executives, entrepreneurs, change-makers, and leaders around the world to understand what they do and how they responded to the pandemic. We’ll talk about many of the lessons shared from the book in this episode.
💥 Kian is the founder of Geolab, an innovation research and training firm empowering leaders through coaching, strategy, and design.
💥 Previously, he was an Executive Director of the XPRIZE Foundation, designing moonshot challenges to solve pressing global problems through partnerships with corporations, foundations and governments.
💥 He was also on the faculty of Singularity University, teaching exponential thinking to thousands of entrepreneurs and executives. Kian has coached the leadership teams of dozens of Fortune 500 companies and is a sought-after public speaker on innovation.
💥 He is a graduate of Northwestern, the London School of Economics, and Harvard Business School.
“Fortune 500 companies are successful because they prioritize efficiency over innovation. They are really good at the world of incremental innovation but they are less good at seeing around the corners and being able to use disruptive trends to build new things.”
– Kian Gohar
💣 4 Value Bombs
💥 1. There are four leadership competencies that consistently showed up in leaders and companies that thrived during the pandemic. Doing all 4 leadership competencies really well puts you in a flow state of being radically adaptable. The four competencies are collaboration, agility, resilience, and foresight.
💥 2. One of the main advantages of working in person is having spontaneous conversations that can lead to an idea or a better relationship. In the new remote world, you should create a culture where you can feel comfortable calling somebody and asking them a question.
💥 3. To improve the foresight of your team/company, task everyone to identify one particular external threat that could impact your business, whether that’s tech, economics, policy, or a competitor. Ask them to track that domain for the course of a month and report back with their findings.
💥 4. Entrepreneurship is a journey, not a career path. It isn’t a path because there is no clear direction of where you are headed. As long as you’re open to learning, pivoting, and working with people who you really admire and who are going to change the world, you’ll open yourself up to a lot of opportunities.
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