The crisis of leadership — and a new way forward | Halla Tómasdóttir and Bryn Freedman

Translator: Leslie Gauthier Reviewer: Krystian Aparta

Bryn Freedman: So you keep talking about leadership

as a real crisis of conformity.

Can you explain to us what you mean by that?

What do you see as a crisis of conformity?

Halla Tómasdóttir: I think it's a crisis of conformity

when we continue to do business and lead in the way we always have,

yet the evidence is overwhelming

that the world needs us to change our ways.

So let's look a little bit at that evidence.

Science has told us that we're facing a climate crisis,

yet 40 percent of board directors

don't think climate belongs in the boardroom.

And we have kids marching in the streets now,

asking us to be accountable for their future.

We have a crisis of inequality.

We have Yellow Jackets not just in the streets of France,

but all over the world,

and yet we continue to see examples

of businesses and other leaders fueling that anger.

BF: Do you think the pitchforks are coming?

HT: I definitely think this is not sustainable.

And the reason why it's so difficult

for us to deal with these complicated crises that are interrelated

is that we are at the lowest levels of trust we've ever been at.

In the UK, three percent of people trust their government

to solve the Brexit crisis,

and that was in December.

I think it's probably gone down since then.

BF: What do you think new leadership actually looks like?

HT: We need courageous leaders,

yet they have to be humble.

And they have to be guided by a moral compass,

and the moral compass is the combination of having a social purpose --

you can't have your license to operate anymore

without a purpose that contributes to society,

but what, to me, has been missing from that dialogue is a set of principles.

We cannot just define why we exist,

we have to define how we're going to do business

and how we're going to lead.

And to us, that has to be to solve these imminent crises:

the climate crisis,

the crisis of inequality

and the crisis of trust.

So at The B Team,

we embrace sustainability, equality and accountability as our principles.

BF: Do you think this whole question of purpose is really window dressing --

they're saying what they think people want to hear,

but they're actually not making the fundamental changes

that are necessary?

HT: A lot of people feel that way,

and I think there's a growing momentum behind that.

So I think the world is calling for responsible leadership now,

and any leader who wants to be around for the 21st century

really needs to start thinking courageously and holistically

how they're going to be part of the solution

and not window-dress anymore.

You have to do it for real now.

BF: Do you see anybody out there who's doing it

in a way that you think is actually effective

and has a real, long-term impact?

HT: Fortunately, we have some great leaders out there.

And just to give one example,

Emmanuel Faber, who's one of the newest members of The B Team,

he's the CEO of Danone,

the world's largest yogurt-maker and major food company --

a real global company.

He's so committed to sustainability

that he's not only changing the ways of his own business,

but his entire supply chain.

He's so committed to equality that when he took on as CEO

and he said gender balance matters,

he created a gender-balanced executive team

and gave men and women equal maternity and paternity leave.

He's so committed to accountability

that he turned his US operations into a B Corporation.

Now many of you may not know what that is,

but that's a company that holds itself responsible

for not just profit but its impact on people and the planet,

and transparently reports on their performance on all of that.

It's the largest B Corp in the world.

So to me, that's holistic, courageous leadership,

and it's really the vision we all need to hold.

BF: Is this "Back to the Future"?

I mean, I wonder, when I think about companies --

Anheuser-Busch comes to mind in America --

a 100-year-old company that invested in its community,

that gave a living wage

before it ended up, you know, losing and getting sold.

Are we really looking now for companies that are global and community citizens,

or is that something that is not even useful anymore?

HT: Well, you can do this for the reason that it's risky, actually,

to continue without doing the right thing now.

You can't attract the right talent,

you can't attract customers

and increasingly, you won't be able to attract capital.

You might do it for risk reasons,

you might do it for business opportunity reasons,

because this is where the growth is,

which is why many leaders are doing the right thing.

But at the end of the day,

we need to ask ourselves:

"Who are we holding ourselves accountable for?"

And if that isn't the next generation,

I don't know who.

So I want to just make very clear,

because we tend to think about leadership

as only those who sit in positions of power.

To me, leadership is not at all like that.

There's a leader inside every single one of us,

and our most important work in life is to release that leader.

And I think one of the greatest global examples we have

of someone who didn't --

no one gave her power --

is the 16-year-old girl called Greta Thunberg.

She's from Sweden,

and a few years ago, she really became --

she has Asperger's,

and she became passionate about our climate crisis --

learned everything about it.

And faced with the evidence,

she just felt so disappointed in her leadership

that she started striking in front of the Swedish parliament.

And now she has started a global movement,

and hundreds and thousands of school kids are out in the streets

asking us to hold ourselves accountable for their future.

No one gave her that authority,

and she now speaks to the leaders of the world, heads of state,

and really is impacting the world.

So I really think that when we think about leadership today,

it can't be defined to those in positions of power

though they have disproportionately greater responsibility.

But all of us need to think about,

"What am I doing?"

"How am I contributing?"

And we need to release that leader inside

and actually start making the positive impact

this world is calling for right now.

BF: But we have such hierarchical leadership.

I mean, I understand what you're saying --

it's nice to release the leader inside --

but in these corporations,

the truth is, it's extremely hierarchical.

What can companies do

to create less vertical and more horizontal relationships?

HT: Well, I'm a big believer and I've long been passionate

about closing the gender gap,

and I really believe gender-balanced leadership is the way to go

in order to embrace a leadership style that has been shown to be more powerful,

and that's when both men and women embrace

both masculine and feminine values.

It actually is proven in research

that that's the most effective leadership style.

But I'm increasingly now thinking about how we close the generational gap,

because look at these young children in the streets around the world --

they're asking us to lead.

Kofi Annan used to say, "You're never too young to lead."

And then he would add,

"Or too old to learn."

And I think we have now entered this era

where we need the wisdom of those with experience,

but we need the digital natives of the young generation

to co-mentor or to mentor us just as much as we can help

with wisdom from the older people.

So it's a new reality,

and these old, sort of hierarchical ways to think about things,

they're increasingly coming under pressure in this reality.

BF: And you've actually called that the hubris syndrome.

Can you talk about that?

HT: Well, yes, I think hubris is our cancer in leadership.

That's when leaders think they know it all,

can do it all, have all the answers

and don't think they need to surround themselves

with people who will make them better,

which to me would, in some cases, be more women and younger people

and people who are diverse and have different opinions in general.

Hubris syndrome is so present in leadership still,

and we know many examples of them,

I don't need to name them. And the problem with that --

(Laughter)

Yeah, we know them -- all over the world,

not just in this country.

But that kind of leadership doesn't unleash leaders in others.

No one person,

or no one sector even has the solutions we now need to come up with --

the creativity and collaboration we need.

The bold and the brave leadership we need to come up with solutions

that cross government, private sector, civil society, young people, older people,

people of all different backgrounds coming together is the way

to solve the issues that are in front of us.

BF: Do you see that kind of leadership coming from the bottom-up

or the top-down,

or do you think a crisis is going to force us

into a reexamination of all of this?

HT: Well, as someone who lived through the most infamous financial meltdown

in my home country, Iceland,

I hope we don't need another one to learn or to wake up.

But I do see that we can't choose one or the other.

We do have to transform the way we lead --

from the top, the boardroom, the CEOs --

we really do have to transform that,

but increasingly, we will transform that,

because we have these social movements coming from the bottom

and throughout society.

And the solutions exist.

The only thing that's missing is will.

So if we just all find a way to embrace a moral compass of our own

to figure out why we exist and how we're going to lead,

and if we embrace courage and humility in equal amounts,

each one of us can be part of this 10-year period

where we can dramatically transform the world we live in,

and make it just,

and make it about humanity and not just the financial markets.

BF: Well, we have a lot of people here who I bet have questions for you,

and we have a few minutes for questions,

so is there anybody that would like to ask Halla a question?

Audience: Hello, my name is Cheryl.

I'm an aspiring leader,

and I have a question about how you lead when you have no influence.

If I'm just an analyst,

and I want to speak to senior management

about a change that I feel will affect the whole company,

how do I go about changing their minds

when they feel as if they've had relationships that are set,

that their way of business is set?

How do you change minds when you have no influence?

HT: Well, thank you very much for that fantastic question.

So sometimes people at the top won't listen,

but it's interesting that with the low trust we have in society right now,

the greatest trust we have

is actually between the employee and the employer,

according to recent research.

So I think that relationship may be the most powerful way

to actually transform the way we do things.

So I would start by trying to build a coalition for your good idea.

And I don't know a single leader today who will not listen to a concern

that many of their employees hold.

I'll give you an example from another B Team leader,

Marc Benioff, the CEO of Salesforce.

He's really been outspoken on homelessness in San Francisco,

on LGBTQI rights,

and all of the things that he's been standing up for,

he does because his employees care about them.

So don't ever think you don't have power if you don't sit in a position of power.

Find the way to go convince him ...

or her.

And Marc, for example, was convinced to close the gender pay gap by two women

who worked inside of his organization,

who told him, "We have a gender pay gap."

He didn't believe it; he said, "Bring me the data."

They did, and he was smart enough to know he needed to do something about it,

and was one the first tech leaders to step up and do so voluntarily.

So don't ever think that you don't have power,

even if you don't sit in a position of power,

but find other people to support you

and make the case.

BF: Thank you.

Anybody else? Any other questions?

Audience: Hi, I'm overwhelmed by fascination

with everything you're saying, so thank you.

I just wanted to ask how, like, diversity in opinion and thought

and also background

has impacted your leadership ability.

And what do you think is the barricade that is limiting the overflow of diversity

in all business settings,

and what do you think can impact the change in that setting

but also to disrupt the overflow of generations of people staying in place?

And what do you think is the next step to breaking several glass ceilings?

BF: We're going to do an entire Salon just on that question.

(Laughter)

HT: I think Bryn said it well, but let me try and touch on it.

So the way I see gender, it is a spectrum --

you know, men also have gender.

We sometimes forget about that.

(Laughter)

We sometimes forget about that.

And I actually played a very masculine woman early in my career,

because those were the rules of the game.

And I achieved some success with it,

but fortunately, I got to a place

where I started embracing my feminine side as well.

But I would still say that the best leaders embrace both,

both women and men.

But I see gender, also,

as one of the most powerful levers to shift values in culture.

So the reason I'm so passionate about women in leadership

and believe that balance is needed

is because right now, our definition of success is incredibly masculine.

It's about financial profit alone or economic growth alone,

and we all know that we need more than money.

I mean, we need wellness:

well-being of people,

and there is no future beyond the well-being of our planet.

So I think gender may very well be one of the most powerful levers

to help all of us shift our economic and social systems

to be more welcoming.

And the answer to your last part --

it's so complicated, but let me try to give you a short one.

I believe that the way talent and consumption is shifting

is going to increasingly get companies

to look at adding difference into their leadership,

because sameness is not working --

BF: And difference is a superpower.

HT: Difference is a superpower.

BF: Thank you very much.

Halla, thank you so much, I wish we could talk to you all day.

(Applause and cheers)

HT: Thank you.

(Applause)