One of the challenges working wider brings is that for most of the time and most of the people, you’re not physically present.  This takes us right to the heart of the working wider challenge:  how do you extend your influence when you’re not there? Influence starts with trust.  Without trust, only fools take initiative [...]

In traditional hierarchies, authority and energy move vertically.  They invite top-down meddling from bosses and bottoms-up dependency from employees who “bump up” difficult issues to avoid risk.  Hierarchies don’t manage cross-functional work or processes well since their natural flow is horizontal.  Working wider is highly dependent on horizontal flows between often widely spaced participants. An [...]

One of the challenges of leading in a wider world is that what is true at home is probably not as true, if at all, when you’re working wider.  For example, George W. Bush’s “cowboy” demeanor may have worked fine in Texas but it didn’t translate well beyond; especially in  Europe.  Search giant Google’s success [...]

When the playing field changes, we need to as well. Every familiar boundary has sprung a leak.  Markets are converging as fast as technologies.  Companies are racing to access what used to be personal social networks.  Governments and sovereign wealth funds replace banks as the source of survival capital.  Firms that initially reached abroad for [...]