Developing Leaders for the Global Frontier

This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. Global business today requires leaders to be like explorers, guiding their organizations through unfamiliar and turbulent environments. With markets, suppliers, competitors, technology, and customers around the world constantly shifting, traditional leadership models no longer work. The authors' three-year study across Europe, North America, and Asia indicates that companies seek more global leaders and desire future global leaders of higher caliber and quality. Research results reveal that every global leader needs certain core qualities: exhibit character, or the capacity to build relationships with people from different backgrounds and to act with high ethical standards; embrace duality, or know when and whether to act and initiate change, depending on country or region; and demonstrate savvy, or recognize worldwide market opportunities and understanding firm capabilities. Inquisitiveness--a sense of adventure and a desire to experience new things--must underlie each of these characteristics. Four strategies are particularly effective in developing global leaders: foreign travel, with immersion in the country's way of life; the formation of teams comprising individuals with diverse backgrounds and perspectives; training that involves classroom and action learning projects; and overseas assignments, which serve to broaden the outlook of future global leaders.

• Hiring and recruitment
• Leadership
• International business