Being Global. Gregory Unruh
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Leaders with significant global psychological capital have the cognitive ability to analyze situations from multiple, even competing, points of view. They have a driving interest in learning about other people's perspectives and are capable of suspending their own judgment in order to more subjectively understand a particular situation.
Global intellectual capital develops in leaders who dedicate time and effort to learning about different parts of the world. Leaders with such capital have strong knowledge of economic and political issues around the world, and they can grasp the inherent complexities of international affairs from multiple national perspectives. Global leaders also recognize how these international trends and events have an impact on their industry and are aware of the major risks and potential rewards involved in operating in various regions.
Global social capital accrues to people whose social networks of friends, colleagues, and contacts stretch beyond one nation or region. Those in possession of strong global social capital display an unusual ability to connect emotionally and communicate effectively with individuals from different cultural backgrounds. They have tact and know how to listen and assimilate multiple viewpoints when making decisions.
Global Entrepreneurship
A global mindset is critical for global leaders' success in building bridges across cultural boundaries, but its true benefit comes when they act as global entrepreneurs and leverage that mindset to create value. That value may come in the form of an innovative new product, a new mode of operation, new forms of financing, or solving existing problems. Global entrepreneurs are both social and political innovators, reaching across boundaries of place and sector to forge value-creating partnerships among business, government, and civil society. They are boundary spanners and “bridgers.”13
Entrepreneurship may take place in new start-ups or within big companies; it might be a social innovation or a hit product. Value, in our definition of entrepreneurship, is not limited to financial returns for investors but includes other forms of individual, organizational, and social benefits.
Global entrepreneurs create value in many ways. They can tap commonalities, or convergence, between markets and cultures. Conversely, they may tap differences, or divergence. More often than not, they do both. They may rely on convergence around certain technologies to gain access to new markets, while leveraging divergence to adapt their supply chain to the available resources of each country.
Global entrepreneurs may also create value by tapping networks that allow solutions to more widely scale across geographies and sectors. Networks can be as literal as the telecommunications or transportation systems that allow ideas and goods to travel long distances. Or they can be as figurative as the business platforms that allow companies in one place to connect with complementary firms in another. Where the networks do not yet exist, a global entrepreneur may create value by building them.
Global Citizenship
Global leaders are not defined just by their mindsets or by the entrepreneurial opportunities they seek out and create, but by how they contribute to the improvement of the context in which they operate. An individual may leverage his global mindset to build a hugely profitable organization that captures divergent value across borders, but if it exploits local people, destroys indigenous resources, or engages in corrupt practices, that individual is not a global leader. Global leaders act as citizens of the world, pursuing challenges and opportunities in a way that brings benefits to everyone involved.
Global citizenship is probably the most difficult leadership characteristic to master because the business environment often encourages leaders to put private gain ahead of personal integrity. Business leaders in particular are under so much pressure to deliver results for shareholders that they often find themselves able to justify all forms of behavior, such as paying bribes to win contracts, cutting corners in employee safety, or loosely interpreting environmental standards.
Global leaders do not play on the edge of the law. They are moved instead by a true desire to make a positive contribution. Some even pursue a social mission as part of their business. Rangina Hamidi, for instance, describes her textile handcraft company, Kandahar Treasure, as employing “women artisans from the Kandahar area in order to develop an economic base for the province and support the advancement of women throughout Afghanistan.” Shai Agassi calls his company Better Place to embody a vision of sustainable personal transportation. Daniel Lubetzky, an entrepreneur who created Kind Healthy Snacks and PeaceWorks Foods, feels so strongly about the social purpose of his ventures that he has registered the phrase “not-only-for-profit.” Business for these leaders is not a zero-sum game with winners and losers. Profit is an outcome from contribution and service.
Even companies that do not have an overt social mission still play a part in transmitting a set of values. Sam Palmisano, chairman of the board and former CEO of IBM, describes his company as a “globally integrated enterprise” in which specific types of work gravitate to where they can be done best, in terms of quality, speed, or cost. In order to coordinate this web of processes, IBM, like other multinationals, promotes a set of core values and standards that hold across geographies. It may globally ban a practice that it considers offensive or unacceptable in one location. While it may seek the path of least resistance in order to minimize costs, it raises levels globally when it comes to values. The idea that one's responsibilities transcend geography or political borders is at the heart of global citizenship.14
Conclusion
The next three chapters delve deeper into the three global leadership characteristics. Chapter 2 is dedicated to global mindset, chapter 3 to global entrepreneurship, and chapter 4 to global citizenship. Each chapter offers clear definitions of each leadership characteristic and numerous examples of modern leaders displaying the three characteristics in real situations to address real opportunities and solve real problems.
Each chapter closes with a set of questions that allow you to assess where you are on the path to developing these skills, as well as some actions you can take to develop and improve. These actions are less suggestions than imperatives. Your results are only going to be as good as the work you put into training yourself to be global.
Questions to Ask, Steps to Take
Below we offer some questions and actions to consider right now, as you look for inspiration from global leaders around you.
Question: Who do you know who has been involved in bringing together people and resources from several national and cultural boundaries to successfully address a global business opportunity or social challenge?
Action: If you know them personally, ask them about their experiences. If you don't know them yet, find a way to be introduced through your social network (through your friends, colleagues, family members, alumni groups, and so on). Ask them: What challenges did you face when addressing the challenge? What surprises did you encounter? What did you learn? Did you come up with the right solution the first time? How did your ideas change?
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Question: Do you know or have access to successful global leaders?
Action: Arrange to interview them about their life journey. Where did they grow up? Where did they go to school? What jobs and career paths did they follow? What was their biggest failure along the way? What did they learn from it?
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Question: How is globalization affecting the industry you work in (or the one you are preparing yourself for)? Who are the global champions in your industry?
Action: Draw those champions' supply chains. Ask yourself: Where do the raw materials come from? Where are products designed, manufactured, and sold? What is the split between national and international revenues? What markets are showing the fastest growth?
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Question: How is globalization affecting your city or region, or the city where you grew up? Are there visible