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At Catalyst this past October, the theme was “Tension is Good“. They explored the notion that not all conflicts are problems to solve and that some are simply tensions that should be managed – despite our nature to try to get rid of all conflict in our lives.  I was reminded of this again while listening to the December episode of Andy Stanley’s leadership podcast where Andy talks about maintaining a healthy dose of tension in our organizations.

The paradox is that some tension is actually good and if you try to solve those, instead of managing them, not only will you be more frustrated, you will actually not be acting in the best interest of your organization.  Have you ever stopped to think about how much effort and time you might be wasting trying to fix or solve problems that you shouldn’t be?  As any civil engineer knows, the right amount and right kind of tension is essential to achieve things that otherwise simply couldn’t be done.  What tensions in your work, personal, family, church life should be managed and not solved?

According to Wikipedia, Web 2.0:

refers to a perceived second generation of web development and design, that facilitates communication, secure information sharing, interoperability, and collaboration on the World Wide Web. Web 2.0 concepts have led to the development and evolution of web-based communities, hosted services, and applications such as social-networking sites, video-sharing sites, wikis, blogs, and folksonomies.

I think that a similar paradigm shift has occurred in our understanding of leadership. Our interaction with the Web and the expectations it creates have shaped what we expect from our leaders.
 
Therefore, if leaders are going to be effective with the current generation of Internet-savvy web-users, they must shift their leadership style. I call this Leadership 2.0. Here’s how it compares to Leadership 1.0:

I love how technology has started to bring a bit a revolution to the paradigm of leadership. In this guest post on the Catalyst blog, Michael Hyatt discusses some of the main points which include:

* Embracing change

* Demonstrating transparency

* Celebrating dialogue

* Encouraging collaboration

* Practices sharing

* Welcomes engagement

* Builds community

Read the article and think about the organizations or leaders today that you admire and want to follow. Do they exhibit Leadership 1.0 or 2.0 characteristics? Which would you prefer to be?