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The Training Imperative
8
/ Canadian Government Executive
// June 2016
Leadership
Networked Leadership:
Deirdre
Moore
D
ispersed organisations can
be very powerful structures.
There is ample evidence that
shows that influential networks
of experts and collaborators can transform
great ideas into game-changing innova-
tions. Canadian public servants live in a
world where both private and public sec-
tors are exploding word clouds onto every
social platform to communicate their rai-
son d’être as embracing “virtual,” “collabo-
ration,” “innovation” and “open.” It may all
seem intuitive and relatively simple. But
leading virtually-networked organisations
is more difficult than many people think.
Although the technology that enables
collaborative work gets the lion’s share
of attention and is predominantly associ-
ated with tech-savvy young profession-
als, the skillset needed to design and lead
dispersed teams is neither technology-
dependent, nor is it generational. It is not
something “you have.” Leading virtual
organisations demands a rigorous exam-
ination—a re-learning—of how to choose
and adopt strategies that will support a
dispersed organisational culture and keep
it driven towards delivering measurable
results.
The virtual organisation: a
network of high-return and
influential relationships
The innovation guru Michael Schrage
wrote twenty years ago in his (ironically
titled)
No More Teams
that “the real basic
structure of the workplace is the relation-
ship. Each relationship is itself a part of
a larger network of relationships. These
relationships can be measured along all
kinds of dimensions–from political to pro-