GK Master Class Recap | Leadership in a Volatile Environment

GK Master Class Recap

On Jan 5, the Guanghua-Kellogg EMBA program kicked off 2023 with a blast. The program welcomed Dr. ZHANG Xinsheng, the former Executive Chairman for Shell companies in Greater China to discuss “Leadership in a Volatile Environment”.

Dr. ZHANG Xinsheng has over 20 years of senior business leadership experience. He served as the Executive Chairman for Shell Companies in Greater China, President of Shell Global Aviation Business, Asia Pacific President and Global Engineering Head for Cabot Corporation, among other roles. Developing young business leaders is one of Dr. Zhang’s personal interests: he served as External Advisory Board Member for Washington University’s McDonnel Academy and lectured at a number of outstanding universities. 

A Rapidly Changing World

In Dr. Zhang’s view, the world has become increasingly volatile. Change happens faster than ever across all industries, with the rapid development of mRNA vaccines a symbol of the new breakneck pace. Geopolitical uncertainty has grown as tensions have grown between nations, but also division grown within societies. New technologies are transforming markets in the blink of an eye as consumer preferences change overnight. Disruptive megatrends have also continued to emerge, exemplified by the advent of autonomous driving and ride-sharing and their potential impact. Effectively navigating this volatility requires more effective leadership.

GK Master Class

The Key to Effective Leadership

To effectively lead businesses in this turbulent environment, Dr. Zhang maintained that leadership is first and foremost about purpose and values. An organization that lacks purpose and values is missing a crucial piece, as purpose provides its employees with a relentless drive to overcome problems and turn them into opportunities. 

Additionally, leadership needs to have a clear vision and a flexible strategy, especially with today’s volatility. This can be accomplished by comprehensive scenario planning that prepares for extreme scenarios, ensuring that a company is prepared for nearly every eventuality.

Your business and team can only be as good as the people you want them to be.

----- Dr. ZHANG Xinsheng

Dr. Zhang also emphasized that effective leadership is about engaging and empowering people. “Your business and team can only be as good as the people you want them to be,” he stated. Despite the common view of the best leader being the smartest person in the room with all the answers, he argued that leadership is about being able to effectively engage people. People leaders that can embrace diversity provide a competitive advantage, as 100 minds with similar backgrounds and thought processes will propose similar approaches, but differently minded employees can propose different solutions, which Dr. Zhang found extremely valuable at Shell.

GK Master Class

Building a Robust Organization

Finally, to deal with today’s volatile environment, Dr. Zhang emphasized that it’s crucial to build an organization with agility, flexibility, adaptability, and collaboration. Agility enables companies to stay relevant and take advantage of volatility. Flexibility can be achieved by moving employees around the organization, which creates employees capable of multiple functions. Adaptability is about quickly adjusting to new changes. Collaboration, one of the most difficult traits to achieve, requires assessing employees on whether they have a collaborative mindset and skillset and providing them with motivation to work together.

Dr. Zhang concluded by stating that new challenges represent new opportunities. By adopting more appropriate leadership in today’s climate and building agile teams, organizations can benefit and thrive in today’s volatility.

This Master Class, the first in-person event in several months, gave our students, alumni as well as attendees from the Guanghua community valuable guidance on agile and effective leadership, especially in today’s turbulent environment. We thank Dr. Zhang for sharing his valuable insights and look forward to hosting more lively debates and discussions in the future.

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About the Guanghua-Kellogg EMBA Program

The Guanghua-Kellogg EMBA Program is the first Sino-US joint EMBA Program in the mainland of China, bringing together the world-class faculties of two premier business schools and featuring a rigorous and cutting-edge curriculum. The program prepares executives with integrated management skills, Chinese business expertise, and a global perspective to lead their organizations in a dynamic environment. Kellogg's EMBA global network offers students opportunities to engage in collaborations with peer leaders across the globe. 

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