Leadership in the Connected Age

Constant communication is more important that ever, as are well-trained people working collaboratively with their colleagues to get their jobs done. In a networked environment, bottlenecks should not hold up the flow of information, no one should have to wait for decisions to be made. Working this way is enormously effective and efficient; however, it can feel subversive to top-down leaders who resist the need for people to connect horizontally across artificial structures. Moving from boxes connected by single lines to a web with multiple and overlapping lines tends to make the people in the top boxes nervous. Leaders and leadership styles have to change in this networked world, but line staff, those responsible for providing services, also need to become leaders and to take additional responsibility for results.

Allison H. Fine, Momentum, p. 49.