When boarding Marine One for the first time, the new president Barack Obama threw the Marine at the door a pretty big curve ball by first saluting, then shaking his hand.  The marine, Obama’s subordinate (remember Obama had just been sworn in as the man’s Commander-in-Chief), seemed more than a little surprised.  The New York Times has a great series of photos here chronicling the event.

At the time, i considered the possibility that this was a move, scripted by the Obama camp, as a symbolic demonstration of a new, inclusive leadership paradigm.  But Obama has continued this practice over the last few months.  The most recent and conspicuous example happened this morning at the G20 summit in London, where CNN cameras caught Obama and Gordon Brown entering a building.   Obama, just ahead of Brown as they entered a narrow door, reached out to the rather surprised British guard outside, who with a broad smile shook Obama’s hand.  Not wanting to seem impolite, he kept his hand extended, assuming that Brown would follow suit.  He did not.  Instead, the British PM went directly inside, forcing the guard to quickly withdraw the gesture and return to his official stance.  Though we must be careful not to infer too much from such small events, we must also be careful not to miss their significance either.

In 1964, media theorist Marshall McLuhan predicted that the advent of electricity and especially electronic communications (starting with the telegraph), started a paradigmatic shift that would occur over the course of tens and perhaps hundreds of years by increasing speed and  ubiquity of information.  Since SociaLens tends to focus on social media in the present, i will mention here that social media is both a product of and contributor to, this ongoing shift.

One result of this shift (and i am paraphrasing a massive amount of McLuhan’s work here) is that, over time, humans would begin to become aware of more of the world all-at-once and as an inclusive whole.  As key skills, knowledge and tools became easier for anyone to create and/or access, hierarchical ways of being and organizing would begin to yield to more inclusive, less-specialized forms of organizing to accomplish goals.  In some earlier related writings, Alexis DeTocqueville (1831) wrote of America that it was, for many reasons (including its media), a more homogeneous democracy than previously existed in France and England.  Assuming that McLuhan and Tocqueville were correct, a likely outcome is that people in leadership, if they are to maximize their effectiveness in leading these more empowered workers, will increasingly  lead by respect and example rather than manage by authority and mandate.

Shaking hands with the guard at the door certainly seems to be  in-line with this sort of leadership, as was the Obama campaign’s use of social media as a way to empower his volunteer campaigners.  It will be interesting to see if there are other practices which begin to emerge over the next decade as Obama and other leaders seek for new ways to lead in a changing culture.

What are some other examples of this new style of leadership or of organizations?