The old model of leadership was built on hierarchy, control, and clearly defined authority. That model is now being tested by agile ways of working, decentralized teams, and AI that can inform decisions at every level of the enterprise.

The question is not whether leadership is changing. It is how far that change should go. Can organizations thrive with less top-down control, or does strong executive direction remain essential for performance, accountability, and resilience?

Contributor

• Alexandre Kozlov, CIO Motion Services Division, ABB
• Andrea Heekelaar, CIO Dacia Brand, Renault
• Mahendra Beharie, CIO, Sub Saharan Africa, DHL

Transcript

Sanjog Aul [00:00:00]:
Hello and welcome to CTN. To learn more about the show, please visit ciotalknetwork.com and the topic for today is The Future of Leadership. Is traditional hierarchy holding us back? So what do we mean with this? What happens is in the world that we are living today, which is fast moved, AI has come to disrupt. We’ve got geographically distributed teams, multi generational teams. Many of those things which were traditionally not there, now they are making an impact. So now what does it do to the way we organize our departments or our business? And in what all ways do we communicate? Does the command and control structure work? We are here to discuss what should be the shape of an organization. Whether hierarchy, the people, the talent, the culture, the way we deal with as IT department with other businesses so that we are more effective as a department and we create most value for the business and we’ll take a business context to it with whatever is going on. So to discuss this, I have Alexandre Kozlov, who is the CIO of Motion Services division with ABB.

Sanjog Aul [00:01:15]:
Hey Alexandre. How are you sir?

Alexandre Kozlov [00:01:17]:
Hi, I’m fine, How are you doing?

Sanjog Aul [00:01:19]:
Very good, very good. Thank you so much for joining us, and I have got Andrea Heekelaar, who’s the CIO with Dacia Brand at Renault. Hey Andrea, how’s things with you?

Andrea Heekelaar [00:01:29]:
Very well. Thank you very much for having me.

Sanjog Aul [00:01:32]:
Great to have you as well, and Mahendra Beharie, he’s the CIO of Sub Saharan Africa at DHL. How are you, Mahendra?

Mahendra Beharie [00:01:41]:
Well, thanks. Great to be here.

Sanjog Aul [00:01:44]:
Beautiful. So, as I’ve kind of tried to set the stage. So Alexandre, let me start with you. You’ve, I’m sure seen through the years how the business has changed, how the organizational designs have changed and we have tried to keep on top of what business wants. What is making things a little more challenging, which is forcing you to rethink how you should structure your department, the culture and everything else in between.

Alexandre Kozlov [00:02:17]:
Well, to begin with, I think the point that you brought in earlier, so the developments of technology and the most recent introduction of tools like AI, definitely plays a role, I would say, and we need also to evolve and adapt to those developments and new ways of doing things, or even not only doing the new things, but also doing the old things in a new way. However, saying that I think we still have areas where the traditional hierarchical structures are necessary, and I will begin with very simple examples when we have environments where you have, let’s say, some kind of critical elements, life related scenes. So this is probably where you would prefer and maybe even demand that you have structures that are very rigid, very hierarchical so that people can basically execute things as it is necessary, as it is stipulated in many also required by process. At the same time, with the economies and industries more and more moving into direction of inventing and innovating, definitely those things will not work in those environments, and this is where we need to kind of look at on the other end of the spectrum and see how we can enable our and empower our teams to create and innovate,

Alexandre Kozlov [00:04:06]:
and this is where probably those hierarchies become more obstacles and roadblocks than anything else. So that’s where things like digital product development or any kind of knowledge workers would be in that category, in my view.

Sanjog Aul [00:04:30]:
So Andrea, based on what Alexandre is saying, that there are disruptions and it’s not the first time we have had disruption, but yeah, this is a unique flavor in itself. Everything is fundamentally been rethought, and yes, there is value in keeping structure, but at the same time, many times those regimentations are the ones which held people back from coming out of the box. We used to say, oh you got to be creative, we should think outside of the box, and now people started saying what box? There should not be any box,

Sanjog Aul [00:05:02]:
and if you did not want any box and you wanted to get people to think in that open manner, in what a way can you remove those shackles, if you will, the chains which come with hierarchy, which comes with reporting structure? I know I’m asking you to eat the cake and have it too, but what would you do in that case?

Andrea Heekelaar [00:05:25]:
I think we all try to find a super moment there because the speed of changes, the speed of obviously how customers and consumers demands are evolving and the competition, all these aspects are probably requiring flexible leadership, I would say, and of course you want to rely on your teams, you want to rely on experts without creating unnecessarily delays or hierarchical layers where you actually do not promote that speed and acceleration, but on the contrary, I think the most important is probably be clear on where the decisions are critical enough to even involve senior leadership and where you can rely on experts in your team, and I think as was said before, certainly there are specific situation which are, I don’t know, safety related in automotive or in my previous companies in the oil and gas sector. Clearly this is non negotiable. Safety related the way you manage risks, these are situation compliance specific standards. There is no flexibility to be introduced there, and accountability clearly is the highest levels. I think when we look at as CIOs and IT experts.

Andrea Heekelaar [00:06:55]:
When you look at the software development, for example, clearly there are frameworks that stimulate that removal of the hierarchy and accelerating the decision among cross functional groups of experts. If you look at agile frameworks like safe, for example, where you already have the processes and the structures to do that, and I think this has been broadly implemented probably in many companies, it is still a challenge for traditional leaders to probably accept that decisions coming from these forums need to be leading, but I think we are getting there through these methodologies and similar tools.

Sanjog Aul [00:07:39]:
So Mahendra, in your case. So I would request you to wear two different hacks. One is of course the CIO hack because that’s the world that you live, but at the same time you’ve got to be empathetic and in fact almost sit in your CEO and other executive management shoes to see what did they want. They did not start or did not work on the company every day just to create a hierarchy or just to do IT. They did to achieve a business goal, which is to use whatever you have at your disposal as a resource or any innovation to its fullest extent. Which means if it was them, they would say forget all hierarchy and everything else, just get me the growth and just get me the savings. So I create the delta,

Sanjog Aul [00:08:24]:
and yes, that is a utopic state, but it could also create chaos. So are we okay to allow some chaos purposely in the interest of larger interest of the business?

Mahendra Beharie [00:08:37]:
I think it’s controlled chaos. I think that to me is where It’s controlled. So if you want to give people autonomy, it’s about wanting to create that culture of failing fast, but give people the opportunity to experiment rapidly in certain cases. So create the sandboxes that people are able to utilize. The guardrails need to be in place so that we keep everything secure, but ultimately it’s about making sure that innovation can thrive. Everyone wants speed and being adapt, adaptable to what innovation can actually unleash and want to be the first to market, but when you bring in cross functional collaboration, all of these things might be able to reduce that speed, but you still got to do it,

Mahendra Beharie [00:09:24]:
and then the other parts related to it is they want it at scale. So when we saying you having those conversations, those robust discussions at a board level and a C suite, and you want him to say we want this in order to drive that revenue growth and in order to see how that ROI is coming in. I think there’s a fine balance between the two, because which ones are actually going to be volatile, which ones are actually going to end up with a regulator that you may have a challenge with, or any sort of legal nuances that are now coming into play, because we’ve got to find balance between using technology as the enabler behind all of this, and now we’ve got to balance everything and say, okay, what is the key thing that we actually want to achieve and how is that going to change? Because if we’ve got control chaos, we still should be able to achieve the one thing that we try to drive or enable it in different ways. So part of that is saying, which ones do we need to be a lot more stringent on and stricter and make sure that all of the I’s are dotted and T’s are crossed, but making sure that we as an organization are able to bring in that accountability within the structure so that we can continue making decisions at speed and rolling out products, and if we’re using AI to do that, we’d be able to accelerate that in certain regards, but we’ve also got to understand what are the risks related to it and are we actually going to tap into a new market and understanding that strategy? Because the strategy to me comes down to value creation, and the value creation is from a customer standpoint,

Mahendra Beharie [00:11:03]:
because if we don’t have a customer at the end of it, what is it that we’re actually trying to drive and keep those simple things back in, as you pointed out. Does it need to be in the box or does it fit into the box? And if not, does it need to run parallel to the box? And I think that’s part of the way in which we’ve got to approach it. It’s not one size fits all, and it’s another magic wand as well, because everyone, when the AI hype started, everyone thought AI could solve everything for you, and as a CIO, you needed to to manage that, because everyone wanted it at scale and say, now you’ve got something that’s going to help you accelerate, but it might not be the solution for that. So don’t overcomplicate things, but simplify the way in which we operate. That becomes a by default almost where it’s an unconscious way in which people operate that allows them their flexibility so that we can unlock the potential that we want to achieve.

Sanjog Aul [00:12:05]:
So, Alexandre, think about experimentation. So we say fail fast, fail small, fail quick, et cetera. These terms are utilized. You can do that with a tech venture sandbox. It put it in isolation and things can work out, and they have worked out. Now think about leadership. Now think about organizational design and the hierarchy and the expectations that you set, and you do not know what’s going to happen, but you still have to put a stake in the ground and say, let us make this structure which with my best or with our collective intelligence, try to create the best possible structure and best possible doctrine of how this leadership, et cetera, will be done,

Sanjog Aul [00:12:50]:
but any adoption of that takes time, number one, and many times those changes are not as easy to roll back, and sometimes it’s almost like a permanent change because you have made a dent on the psyche and on the culture within the organization. So if you are tasked, and I’m sure you are already tasked with saying, okay, give me your view on what you would like leadership to look like within your department, or maybe at the management level overall, at the business side, and what would you like the organization design to look like for it to serve the purpose? And you will pass your comment and, or thoughtful comment and your input, and it is possible because it’s still an experiment, it may not go in the direction you would like. What do you do to deal with it so that your chances of failing slash, not reaching or not hitting the mark are minimized? Because there the fail fast forward, fail small, fail quick mantra may or may not fly.

Alexandre Kozlov [00:13:58]:
Well, first let me maybe a little bit comment on what Mahendra was bringing earlier and just look at a little. Also I like this fail first, but it’s if you look at the big picture, so companies are here to make profits. So we can make great products, we can make bold value statements and strategy states, but at the end of the day, companies are here to make profits, and when we create something, a new product, new service, obviously any hierarchical structure would be slowing down the process or maybe even destroying it altogether. However, once we and this is where the place where this free bubble environment with crazy ideas and quick kind of collaboration between the teams, different from different departments, different functions, plays a very important role, but once we kind of come to here is something that we want to do, then we enter in a completely different stage or phase, and I would probably pull in here example from Andrea’s industry.

Alexandre Kozlov [00:15:37]:
So we can have all sorts of creative people and environments when we design a new car, but once we design this car, then when we start producing, we want to have every car produced in a cookie cutter manner. Not that every car is kind of reinvented again and again. So in that sense we cannot go either extreme, and the challenge is very often for companies as the within the same company, within the same environment, within the same function, you basically required to maintain both models. Depending in which at what stage you are staying to your points and questions. The most, well not most, but recent focus on product based teams probably could be somehow an answer where you have not the whole company but parts of the company focusing on a particular business life, particular business product and we form teams that are self sufficient in a way that if it’s, let’s say a physical product, then you have people from marketing, people from sales, people from support organization operations who kind of maintain and support it through the whole life cycle, but that’s again this is focused just on their product so they’re not doing something else,

Alexandre Kozlov [00:17:13]:
but here we probably again coming back and maybe contradicting a little bit myself, we still need them to have some kind of overarching hierarchy on the top of all those products where senior management will decide, well, this is the product line or this is the product where we want to invest and develop further. Whereas this one we discontinue for whatever reasons, whether it’s profitability or maybe change in the company’s directions and product flows. So that’s how I would see it and approach it, and then when you execute, of course, then you have all sorts of models and management tools that you apply. One could be more applicable for hierarchies and kind of rigid structures within the organization, whereas others are more flexible with all this scrum and agile methods that come into play in the recent years.

Sanjog Aul [00:18:21]:
So Andrea, do you think we can sandbox leadership? Can we pilot leadership leadership? Can we sandbox or pilot organizational design? Can we create silos? Yeah, we create those hero teams, if you will, sometimes for the initiatives which are very specific with the business value to be created. A strategy is there and inputs are there and outputs are defined. That’s like a project or an initiative, but when it comes to getting people to start thinking differently and try to rewire themselves to get ready for this new age disruptive organizations and the world that we are dealing with, have you found a way to do it versus it’s all or nothing and it’s not a big bang. What’s worked for you?

Andrea Heekelaar [00:19:11]:
I think, can we sandbox leadership and organizational design? I think we’ve always done that. I don’t know if we always position it as sandbox, but I think there has been such an evolution of different leadership styles, different operating models, different organizational structures that I think organizations have always been searching for what works for a specific environment, specific I don’t know even geopolitical situation or whatever that matters in that question for that question, and I think if you look at already current models, current leadership is so different from the past where the hierarchy has been much more defined and applied, implemented in a very strict way, obviously, and it was even. Well, we all know from examples from the past where employees would never be able to freely speak to senior leaders, et cetera. I think that changed tremendously already, and I expect further change of course for when AI is not only an experimental aspect of what we do, where we don’t only try to increase efficiency of different processes, different tasks, but when we really embed it AI as part of the organization and we lead teams which have a, which consist of humans and I guess AI agents or when it’s much more hybrid from that perspective,

Andrea Heekelaar [00:20:57]:
and I think. I don’t know if it’s a jump or if it’s a kind of natural evolution that we are undergoing because we see it coming in. I think the, where I see the biggest opportunity probably is that we don’t forget. So firstly that we really embrace what’s coming at us, because I also see that there is some fear or that there are some discussions about okay, AI is coming to get your jobs. I don’t want to go there in this conversation, but you see that people are also aware of potential negative aspects which may have huge impact on adoption, on the motivation, on how people evolve and continue investing in their education even, et cetera.

Andrea Heekelaar [00:21:47]:
Of course, in the era where you can get any data and information easily from generative AI, the whole society is kind of shifting. There have been very interesting publication this year also coming from for example world economic forum meeting about how we need to protect our brain, human brain, and continue evolving it in the way, but back to your question. I think I would rather see it as a great opportunity to actually focus leadership. So yes. Is it a sandbox? I think definitely, probably first selectively, but to show and learn and fail. I don’t know if fast or in what way, but to really grasp it better, but we have to introduce this type of leadership where more and more gradually the focus and for me it’s a very positive focus where the human leadership will be much more focused on really the unique qualities of human beings, which is indeed not only in the logic and fast, I don’t know, application of data, knowledge and expertise, but also much

Andrea Heekelaar [00:22:58]:
more digging into the why making unexpected changes maybe or choices. Sorry, maybe looking more at the well being of the organization in the future that may not come out of the data that normally AI would predict or recommend, but using different value system and specific unique human qualities to take certain decisions. So I think the leadership will definitely focus much more on creating such an environment where we get the best out of AI and AI tools and the best out of humans. While in the past years perhaps there’s been too much focus on leadership managing processes and managing the daily routine or daily, weekly, monthly routine of the organization. So I see there’s a huge opportunity. I don’t know yet how to modulate or how to create an environment, but certainly I do see a very strong shift in that direction.

Sanjog Aul [00:24:08]:
So Mahendra, in sales and marketing there’s a concept used or rather in marketing they say problem unaware, problem aware, solution unaware, solution aware. These are the stages through which we go in marketing. That’s how you get your customers, etc. Why I bring this up is because the environment is changing around us. Some people who are problem unaware may keep doing things because of either lack of ability or inertia. If they were aware, maybe the heat will be on and people will start spending a little more time on it. So anything which gets done, or rather not get done is because of lack of intent or lack of ability or pure inertia. These are the three things why some things are not done. So now let’s bring it back to the context of what we are talking about here in this newer world of disruption.

Sanjog Aul [00:25:08]:
If we choose to sit and not oblivious but maybe knowing that this is what’s coming our way and we say we are trying to figure this out and nothing wrong, there’s a process, but is that enough? If we say well I know the problem and even I know the solution, are we willing and are we given the empowerment to experiment to the degree we can? So you can look back one year from now and we do not look like equally struggling with the ways we are struggling today. So my question is where are we and are we actually looking at it as a business, this word of transformation that we’re trying to do, are we looking at it as an initiative or otherwise there is another disruption, something new that has happened. It’ll take its own time. Are we not time boxing it? Are we not giving some rigid timelines to say we are going to lose if we don’t pay serious attention and give this initiative a serious structure of transformation?

Mahendra Beharie [00:26:09]:
Yes. So great way to look at it. I think that we are different companies and different people may be at different points on that bell curve. So when you look at a hype cycle and you’ve seen what’s at the top of it or who’s at the beginning of it, I think all of these things change. I think the biggest thing for me sits in the fear portion. If we talking about all of the things that when change comes about, it’s a fear of change and therefore people may be reluctant to actually take a step out into the unknown. You may have a solution as you pointed out, but it’s that lack of momentum, it’s lack of that grit, that bite that people need to go out and go and do it, and I think part of that is leaders is saying we’ve got to have and change that mindset to say that we want to be vulnerable in certain regards, and I mean vulnerability is a big thing as a leader because when people may look at it in two different ways,

Mahendra Beharie [00:27:08]:
but I think that if we don’t understand where people into an organization or into a process, they’re all looking for a sense of purpose, they’re looking for a sense of belonging. I think what we’ve got to do is we’ve got to create that so that people feel secure in that space, that they’re able to think outside of the box, that they’re able to go out and try to solve for different things and give them the opportunity to be a part of it, because traditions may have stopped us and hindered us from saying, we could get this done by using this type of technology. We could use generative AI, we could use agentic AI and now idyllic AI. All of these things are all foreign languages to everyone, and we saying if we then help them along that journey and create it, we’ll help them to understand it a lot better. We’ll create that safety net that people are looking for, because when you spoke about like even from a branding and a marketing standpoint, all of these things are looking for key elements that they use as measures behind it.

Mahendra Beharie [00:28:13]:
Their measures of success needs to be technology that enables it. We need leaders that are able to embrace those changes and simplify to a way that people can understand it and then take it to the next level because if we just leave it as, it is in that box, it’s going to die a slow death, and I think part of this is saying that change needs to be done at speed. That over control destroys things that we currently have. If our competitors landscapes changing and we falling behind, we might get left behind we might fall off the cliff, and I think that’s part of the discussions that when we look at ourselves in the mirror as leaders and saying in this space, how is it going to change? I think that needs to be the key.

Sanjog Aul [00:29:04]:
Alexandre, do you think there is a rush because we can go nuts trying to do things yesterday. Is there truly a rush? And in many times when you get almost into a mode of panic and or rush our approach to how we process what’s there, the constraints, we might amplify what the constraints are, and then secondly, what is our dream outcome? Our dream outcome and outcomes of the business leaders who we are supporting. That could also get distorted then based on which, when we are panicking, we might find or think that we found a shortcut, but it may not work in the long haul or it will not give us the outcome. So, we can have this conversation like we are having today, but should this conversation itself be built on this sense of urgency which is also created by us, or should we pause and not just go nuts and then see if our answers and our processing is different than what it is today?

Alexandre Kozlov [00:30:15]:
Well, I would say that speed should be dictated by the objective and circumstances rather than our desire or someone else desire, but what I want maybe to begin with first is that the failures or disappointments with a new technology and most recent one is AI, is that we try to apply it like a harbor to a screw. So we do not really rethink our environments, our processes. I have example that I very often use with my team is that when you want to automate your communication, then you don’t invent a robot to stick stamps and enclose envelopes. You invent email, which requires completely different thinking and completely different tool set and operating model afterwards. So that kind of literate application of a new technology to the way we do things usually is the first thing that creates then disappointments and failures. In my view, the rush is there,

Alexandre Kozlov [00:31:45]:
and here I could probably make a reference to big software company that software of who we use on a daily basis that basically over the years kind of instilled in our mind that it’s okay to have bugs in the program and you will get a service pack to fix them. So that’s in my view something that should have not been tolerated from the beginning, but now it’s matter of course that yeah, you got the software, it’s with bugs and they will be fixed or maybe not even fixed before the whole product will die and market or something else. So that’s self in your word self imposed rush. I think it’s not helping the progress, it’s not helping the consumers. Even though that there might be some kind of feeling that, I’ve got new release of my product with hundreds more functions and functionalities but question do you really need it? Do you really need them so fast and how have you used other 500 that already in place in the previous release? So that I would question because there then you as a company spend hell a lot of time and resources to develop those but the satisfaction on the customer side is not there because it’s buggy, it’s not working properly, and that’s kind of backfires to you.

Sanjog Aul [00:33:40]:
So thank you. So Andrea, there are four personality slash styles that people have used as leaders. They are no people. They are no but people. There are yes people and then there are yes and people. CXOs typically CIOs used to earn a bad name when they used to say no, you cannot do that. So they would be seen as people who are stifling innovation. Then they said okay, let me just put some caveats. So then they migrated to no but,

Sanjog Aul [00:34:16]:
and then that itself was not seasoned enough because they were seen as friction points. So they said no, I can’t even stay there. So we became yes but people. In a way I will say yes but, and maybe there’s a fifth category, ? And then finally they got to the yes people, and now because AI has come suddenly what you could accomplish with IT with mere mortal humans, now you’ve been augmented with digital workers. Now either the CXOs or CIOs themselves are becoming yes and or there’s an expectation from management that these people will become yes and which means you will always have a more than spilling plate, and when you take more than you can chew, things are going to fall apart.

Sanjog Aul [00:35:02]:
The true changes that you wanted to bring about or the value you wanted to bring about with the sheer volume the quality and the outcome will suffer. So talk about Andrea here today. Where are you in that spectrum and how is that spectrum changing for you for good or for worse?

Andrea Heekelaar [00:35:22]:
Great question. I think so if we continue on the path of AI adoption, et cetera, but it can be taken much more broadly, of course. I think there are still obviously AI comes with many risks, at least the unknown side of it and unpredictability and many question marks we have about scaling about even costs of operating it, different risks, the ethical methods, et cetera in the past. So the role of the CXO in creating awareness about these aspects within the organization, within the business remains. I think that this unpopular side of our jobs is still a key part of what we have to do also because often we are also on the learning curve, on the learning side, of course, as the technology or as the concepts evolve, and I think, of course, the risk appetite is always a business decision, but understanding it, understanding different aspects is our role to bring and to make sure that our CEO, et cetera, are able to take the decisions.

Andrea Heekelaar [00:36:44]:
If I look at how AI can help in pushing or getting more. Yes, or I don’t know if that’s the way how you formulated it. I believe that there are also, there are sites where, the leadership, we see that IT digital, the silos, traditional silos, it’s not true even today, but I think in the future it will be much more hybrid. I do see in my experience how much innovation is coming directly from the business. They are it’s not label driven. There are many really digitally savvy people in, not in functions, but in the business functions, and they are very well connected in the networks of I don’t know vendor suppliers, but also consultancies, et cetera. I think we are learning together, we are jointly in it and sometimes I think we also need to be humble in accepting it, that there are many insights actually coming from, not from the digital authorities in the organization, but of course also digital leaders in the business, etc.

Andrea Heekelaar [00:38:04]:
And that we jointly carry that responsibility for enabling or creating the environment where people experiment more, where we can quickly get value out of the art of possible, I would say, but at the same time, where we do it smartly, and I think this doing it smartly is probably where we need to focus on. So as an example, I think in the early days of adopting AI, we have seen an attempt, of course, you focus very much on education in the business, making sure that they don’t need to depend in using the new tools and concepts. They don’t need to depend very much on experts in IT and digital, et cetera, being much more an enabler, but when we focused on making sure that as many processes, business processes, have some kind of a portion of AI, or that we experimented with embedding AI in different broad scale of different business processes, of course there was a lot of duplication of proofs of concepts and there was probably a bit of a risk of waste potentially because everybody tried something and it was a bit uncontrolled, et cetera, but it was probably an important storm to go through. I think now that we are much smarter in setting up the governance which needs to be cross functional but also with specific roles like AI catalysts which really help working together with the business with IT, with the different functions, also HR of course, from the capabilities, development perspective, finance, everybody actually needs to contribute ethics and compliance to take the decisions. I think now we are getting in much better shape in being more strategic in choices and investments in AI,

Andrea Heekelaar [00:40:20]:
but again there is still enough unknown and I’m still keen to understand better also from other colleagues where we found a real breakthrough in scaling up fast, because I think everybody has been through the phase of experimenting and really focusing on productivity gains and efficiency increases, but when we I don’t know how many companies really mastered already this transition to really

Andrea Heekelaar [00:40:55]:
revolutionizing some of the key core processes thanks to AI, and I think that’s the step when also different type of leadership and different type of collaborative models will probably become more urgent.

Sanjog Aul [00:41:12]:
So Mahendra, in your world, one is of course I would love for you to share anything that you are doing in your organization. To Andrea’s point on how are you looking to make sure that the AI enabled outcomes that truly work at scale versus only in sandbox or only in that tiny corner? That’s one, on the other side, there is also an important thing that is coming up which is connected to ownership AI, especially in the agentic world, sometimes it just creates some weird outcomes,

Sanjog Aul [00:41:47]:
and you make a decision based on that, which in turn could create some, negative or positive outcomes for the business. So when we are building together, all outputs are taken, but it’s kind of a black box. You can talk about explainability but still there is quite a bit of black box. So if you’re saying I’m going to make AI happen, but there could be things which are black box to me. So how do I take ownership? And then the management agrees for you to not take the ownership or we take collective ownership of all that, and leadership is ownership if you think about it. So what does an organization or a person do in your role to take care of this ownership part? So let’s start with what Andrea said.

Sanjog Aul [00:42:35]:
What are you doing to help AI outcomes work at scale?

Mahendra Beharie [00:42:39]:
So I think it’s about understanding what does a proof of concept look like. So the first part that we do from an organization standpoint is that we allow people to, to develop their own tools,

Mahendra Beharie [00:42:52]:
but for one or two users, the moment it gets to five or more, it’s got to go through a process. So we’ve put some guardrails in place to say if we wanted to do this, here’s the framework and the guidelines that we need to operate, and this is how we need it to operate, and then we’ve got some control mechanisms that are checking it in the background. So then we can say, okay, fine, does that meet all of the respective guidelines? Does that meet from a compliance standpoint? Does it meet from a branding standpoint? Does it meet everything from a safety and a risk standpoint? And then we can say, great, now we’ve given you a platform that allows you to do that, and now we look at how does that scale. Now, the complexity that we work with is we operate in over 220 countries globally. Now, the challenge with that is saying, how do you get this at scale? Because one market differs to another. You need to be able to have that ability to adapt certain, certain key things we’ve learned from historical purposes and said, okay, great, these are the things that we know are going to happen. These are the nuances, be it language, and I’ll take something as simple as that,

Mahendra Beharie [00:44:03]:
because you’re operating in a different language. You need to be able to adapt that so that people understand it, and by using technology, we can cross

Mahendra Beharie [00:44:11]:
those barriers a lot smoother than what we had to do in the past, and that to me saying, we then created a platform that every idea that a person has, no matter how big or how small it is, that they allowed to put it out and voice it, then we created a support mechanism for them. Part of that is saying, if that innovation is moving in the direction, the thought and the idea, and that thought leadership is actually embraced, we started seeing more ideas coming through and we caught a lot more in that net. Part of the entire thing is saying, what does that journey look like next? Now we’ve got all of the subject matter experts that can help guide them so it doesn’t look like they stumbling or hitting a barrier. It’s saying, let’s guide them as to how they navigate this landscape. In terms of AI, part of how we do that is saying, where does that ownership lie? I think it’s all of the stakeholders. The stakeholders in that entire process become part of the owners, because everyone wants to feel a sense of belonging, they want to feel a sense of identity, they want to feel that sense that they contributed to it.

Mahendra Beharie [00:45:22]:
So the minute you change that, it becomes, you’ve now taken my idea and somebody else is running with it. Remember that recognition portion that we working on deals with the human emotion, because the minute we start deviating from it, I think that people either feel left out of the loop as opposed to being a part of the process, and that’s something that we’ve worked really hard at within the organization to make sure that people understand it and have them as champions within it so that they’re able to move at speed, but within the guardrails that’s being created, and it’s a purpose led sort of initiative that we wanting to do that creates value driven leaders that are enabled behind it and we recognize it in different ways. So where we’ve got ideas that come through on different scales, the leadership actually comes to play because we recognize them, we give them a platform to share their ideas,

Mahendra Beharie [00:46:18]:
and be it on a global stage, be it on a regional stage or even a country stage, because that sense of pride and passion shines through no matter what, and when we talk about ownership, who really owns it? If you get into the T’s and C’s of the entire thing or the fine print, it’s owned by the organization. The recognition helps you drive that culture that we want him to create, and that to me is where it sort of comes together, because all of the stuff that we doing is powered by AI or technology, but the future leaders don’t just run organizations, they enable it to consistently evolve and continuously evolve, and part of that is creating that platform. So as opposed to the black box, I think that sometimes you get a peek into it and it’s a little bit more clear,

Mahendra Beharie [00:47:09]:
and if you create that, people embrace it as opposed to run away from it in fear.

Sanjog Aul [00:47:17]:
So Alexandre, given what Mahendra mentioned about the guardrails and purpose driven and this is what essentially charges up people. Now let’s talk about soft metric versus hard metric. So you want to bring change, but you also want to get results, and at some point the CFO will frown to say what the heck are you doing? Show me the money. How do you show them the money? But set appropriate expectations without being loosey goozy about it, and at the same time keep the room for yourself so that the changes that are to be brought about within people, with the culture, with the way it works, with the hierarchy, which takes time, you get the buffer for it, but in absence of either or, this would be a short lived conversation among all parties involved. Because something will go down the drain, somebody will get fired,

Sanjog Aul [00:48:13]:
and people don’t have patience anymore.

Alexandre Kozlov [00:48:17]:
Well, look first of all I always. My conversations with my business colleagues in the framework of what they want to achieve, what is the objectives. It’s not about how this is going to be implemented, executed or maintained going forward, and that creates completely different setup. So we are discussing and agreeing to outcomes in business language, whether it’s more revenue, whether it’s quicker time to market or whatever, depending on the solution. That also gives me that flexibility and room to execute it with the technology that I believe is appropriate for that particular case and also is suitable for the setup of my organization, my team and platforms that we are using, but of course, you correctly pointed out that at the end of the day, the results should be delivered and the CFO or president should see the impact on the bottom line, positive impact on the bottom line.

Sanjog Aul [00:49:42]:
So with that said so, Andrea, let’s start with this round of questioning, which is just one question and an important one. We discussed about hierarchy, we discussed about leadership, we discussed about AI, but what is it that one thing, not many, just one thing which you will fix in yourself so that you get ready for the crazy world ahead. Because it starts, the change starts with you ? As an individual, it starts with all of us if you want the change. So what is it you feel you need to embrace or fundamentally fix in yourself in the way you think, in the way you lead, in the way you communicate, in the way you build hierarchy? Pick any area which you would consciously put on the table and say, yes, this is what my to do for the best outcome.

Andrea Heekelaar [00:50:34]:
It feels slightly confrontational, I must say.

Sanjog Aul [00:50:38]:
No, no, I mean you can just be honest, ? Because all leaders, they’re confident, but they’re also vulnerable, but if you’re not working on ourselves and we say the rest of the world should fix themselves, it doesn’t go very far, and we are all setting examples.

Andrea Heekelaar [00:50:51]:
Exactly. No, and absolutely. I think I’m always honest when it comes to these matters because I think it’s also a very humbling experience to realize that some of the more traditional pillars of credibility, like strong domain expertise, domain knowledge, et cetera, are becoming perhaps less relevant and et cetera, different aspects of leadership are becoming more critical. I think you hear recently maybe I will steal a little bit from others because I think it’s inspiring when you focus on. Because often probably we know better, we can articulate better what we are proud of and we definitely want to continue doing, et cetera, but I think there are aspects of unlearning many things to be more open minded and open to, indeed these new approaches, et cetera, and I think throughout many years, probably of our practice and our expertise, we’ve embedded many frameworks, many methods that we use in developing and coordinating teams which are simply not valid anymore which don’t work with new generations, but sometimes in the context of the speed of how things are evolving and, and probably ambiguity of some of the evolutions will not work. So I think, I will make sure that I, in some cases I will continue the humbleness journey to actually realize that many of the frameworks and kind of more static, I don’t know, pillars so for my expertise and knowledge may not be that relevant in the future and that I really need to listen and open, open up to different experts but also different.

Andrea Heekelaar [00:52:56]:
People in the organization, but also outside and really be very open minded. I think still decisive and of course playing my role effectively, but I think that unlearning some of the things which are not the ultimate truth any is a very important step.

Sanjog Aul [00:53:14]:
Thank you, Mahendra.

Mahendra Beharie [00:53:17]:
So great question. At least I had a little bit more time to think about answer that’s lovely. So thanks for that.

Mahendra Beharie [00:53:24]:
So for me I think it sort of looks like a ecosystem orchestrator.

Mahendra Beharie [00:53:31]:
So no longer looking at it as not just a system owner. It’s about changing that mindset. Mindset if you’d like, and I probably want to put out a quote there from Benjamin Zander. It says, who am I being that my people’s eyes are not shining? And I think for me it lies within that. It’s about me being self aware of certain things that are happening around me so that I can make those little changes and tweaks to make sure that I can help them through that journey, and for me it’s saying if we become that, then I can share my story a lot better, that I can read a little, I can learn a little, I can do a lot more just based on that because sometimes I find it hard to find the time,

Mahendra Beharie [00:54:18]:
and now what you’ve got to do is you’ve got to make the time. So that’s what I’ve learned and for an adjustment from my side, it’s about making the time for certain things, because we often talk about a work life balance, we often talk about, but it’s more in the execution of it because words that we use matter but it’s about the action that we take that’s going to derive that value. So for me it sits in that because the more I reflect upon looking in the mirror and saying what do I need to be doing differently to help these people along this journey. That to me, is what I’m working on at the moment.

Sanjog Aul [00:54:55]:
Beautiful. Alexandre, we started with you, we’re going to end with you. So what’s your one thing?

Alexandre Kozlov [00:55:01]:
I would say that Andrea was actually using some of the words that I wanted to say about that, and I was kind of learning that you can say motto in one of my companies that I was working before. Learn, unlearn, and relearn. So that’s very kind of when you see deep into that’s very much emphasizes the way you should kind of approach yourself and how you deal with subjects and with matters on your daily basis, but at the same time, again, there is also important word that you were using in your question is about leaders and leadership, and to me, leadership has a meaning when you have followers. So if there is no one who follows you are not a leader. You might be a charismatic personality, but not a leader,

Alexandre Kozlov [00:56:11]:
and as long as people follow you, it means that you kind of fulfill their dreams. You paint the picture of the future. You kind of set up goals and objectives that inspire them to grow, to develop that’s something that is very important for any leader, and of course, then to remain humble and empathetic in this crazy world that we have today, that’s also very important.

Sanjog Aul [00:56:46]:
Well, so thank you so much, Alexandria, Andrea, and Mahendra for sharing your thoughts. I hope you had fun going through this interesting journey of how we look within ourselves, look around us, and see how we can create value with this newer world, and hopefully the hierarchical world may not melt away, but it might take a different shape given the type of volatility and the flexibility we would like to have we have in our world and the flexibility we want to have in the way we operate, but so thank you so much for taking the time.

Alexandre Kozlov [00:57:19]:
Thank you.

Sanjog Aul [00:57:21]:
And to our audience, please join us on our social media, our places, where our podcast exists, and thank you so much. This is Sanjog Aul, your host, signing off. So till next time, take care and God bless.