LEADERSHIP IN VOLATILE TIMES

Sa？etak Today many companies have to struggle with different challenges such as having to face increasing volatility and ambiguity in the markets. From a global perspective, the average engagement of employees is very low. Managers tend to be overloaded with data and lose contact to the strategic perspective. Hence there are several examples of companies and NPOs which have found ways to solve problems like these. They function on the basis of a self-organization with decentralized decision-making instead of a hierarchical pyramid. Despite distinct features in detail, this kind of a relatively new way of organizing may be summarized with the following characteristics: purpose-driven, distributed authority, self-management, and wholeness. In this paper, I review characteristics, strengths and challenges of these approaches based on a literature review and case studies. Some popular misconceptions are also addressed. The paper shows different approaches of how to implement or rather integrate self-organization with decentralized decision-making. Furthermore, some topics are discussed which may become crucial during such an organizational change process